
Class. 
Book. 



COPYRIGHT DEPOSIT 



GITANJALI AND 
FRUIT-GATHERING 



'j^^y^ 



THE MACMILLAN COMPANY 

NEW YORK • BOSTON • CHICAGO • DALLAS 
ATLANTA • SAN FRANCISCO 

MACMILLAN & CO., Limited 

LONDON • BOMBAY • CALCUTTA 
MELBOURNE 

THE MACMILLAN CO. OF CANADA, Ltd. 

TORONTO 




Paintid by Suitdalal Hose 



CITANJALI AND 
FRUIT- GATHERING 

BY SIR RABINDRANATH TAGORE 
WITH ILLUSTRATIONS BY NANDALAL 
BOSE.SIIRENDRANATH KAR. ARMSIIN 

DRANATH TACX)RB» AND NOBENDRANAIH 
TAGORE 




THE MACMIUAN COMPANY 



\ 






N^ 



COPTBISHT, 1916, 

bt the macmillan company. 



JfXW ILLUSTRATED EDITION. 

COPTRIQHT, 1918, 

Bt the macmillan COMPANY. 
Set up and electrotyped. Published September, 1918. 



NoriDooIi iprt«0 

J. S. Gushing Co. — Berwick <fc Smith 0©. 

Norwood, Mass., U.S.A. 



OCT -1 1918 V 



4 



TO 

WILLIAM ROTHENSTEIN 



INTRODUCTION 

A FEW days ago I said to a distin- 
guished Bengali doctor of medicine, "I 
know no German, yet if a translation of 
a German poet had moved me, I would 
go to the British Museum and find 
books in English that would tell me 
something of his life, and of the history 
of his thought. But though these prose 
translations from Rabindranath Tagore 
have stirred my blood as nothing has 
for years, I shall not know anything 
of his life, and of the movements of 
thought that have made them possible, 
if some Indian traveller will not tell 
me. " It seemed to him natural that I 
should be moved, for he said, *'I read 



viii GITANJALI 

Rabindranath every day, to read one 
line of his is to forget all the troubles 
of the world. '* I said," An Englishman 
living in London in the reign of Richard 
the Second had he been shown trans- 
lations from Petrarch or from Dante, 
would have found no books to answer 
his questions, but would have ques- 
tioned some Florentine banker or Lom- 
bard merchant as I question you. For 
all I know, so abundant and simple is 
this poetry, the new Renaissance has 
been born in your country and I shall 
never know of it except by hearsay." 
He answered, "We have other poets, 
but none that are his equal; we call this 
the epoch of Rabindranath. No poet 
seems to me as famous in Europe as 
he is among us. He is as great in 
music as in poetry, and his songs are 
sung from the west of India into Bur- 
mah wherever Bengali is spoken. He 
was already famous at nineteen when 



INTRODUCTION ix 

he wrote his first novel; and plays, 
written when he was but Httle older, 
are still played in Calcutta. I so much 
admire the completeness of his life; 
when he was very young he wrote 
much of natural objects, he would sit 
all day in his garden; from his twenty- 
fifth year or so to his thirty-fifth per- 
haps, when he had a great sorrow, he 
wrote the most beautiful love poetry 
in our language"; and then he said with 
deep emotion, ''words can never ex- 
press what I owed at seventeen to his 
love poetry. After that his art grew 
deeper, it became religious and philo- 
sophical; all the aspirations of man- 
kind are in his hymns. He is the first 
among our saints who has not refused 
to live, but has spoken out of Life it- 
self, and that is why we give him our 
love." I may have changed his well- 
chosen words in my memory but not 
his thought. "A little while ago he 



X GITANJALI 

was to read divine service in one of 
our churches — we of the Brahma Samaj 
use your word 'church' in English — it 
was the largest in Calcutta and not 
only was it crowded, people even stand- 
ing in the windows, but the streets 
were all but impassable because of the 
people." 

Other Indians came to see me and 
their reverence for this man sounded 
strange in our world, where we hide 
great and little things under the same 
veil of obvious comedy and half -serious 
depreciation. When we were making 
the cathedrals had we a like reverence 
for our great men? "Every morning 
at three — I know, for I have seen it" — 
one said to me, "he sits immovable in 
contemplation, and for two hours does 
not awake from his reverie upon the 
nature of God. His father, the Maha 
Rishi, would sometimes sit there all 
through the next day; once, upon a 



INTRODUCTION xi 

river, he fell into contemplation because 
of the beauty of the landscape, and the 
rowers waited for eight hours before 
they could continue their journey." He 
then told me of Mr. Tagore's family 
and how for generations great men 
have come out of its cradles. "To- 
day," he said, "there are Gogonen- 
dranath and Abanindranath Tagore, 
who are artists; and Dwijendranath, 
Rabindranath 's brother, who is a great 
philosopher. The squirrels come from 
the boughs and climb on to his knees 
and the birds alight upon his hands." 
I notice in these men 's thought a sense 
of visible beauty and meaning as though 
they held that doctrine of Nietzsche 
that we must not believe in the moral 
or intellectual beauty which does not 
sooner or later impress itself upon 
physical things. I said, "In the East 
you know how to keep a family illustri- 
ous. The other day the curator of a 



xii GITANJALI 

Museum pointed out to me a little 
dark-skinned man who was arranging 
their Chinese prints and said, *That 
is the hereditary connoisseur of the 
Mikado, he is the fourteenth of his 
family to hold the post.'" He an- 
swered. "When Rabindranath was a 
boy he had all roimd him in his home 
literature and music." I thought of 
the abundance, of the simplicity of the 
poems, and said, "In your country 
is there much propagandist writing, 
much criticism? We have to do so 
much, especially in my own country, 
that our minds gradually cease to be 
creative, and yet we cannot help it. If 
our life was not a continual warfare, we 
would not have taste, we would not 
know what is good, we would not find 
hearers and readers. Four-fifths of our 
energy is spent in the quarrel with bad 
taste, whether in our own minds or in 
the minds of others." "I understand," 



INTRODUCTION xiii 

he replied, "we too have our propagan- 
dist writing. In the villages they recite 
long mythological poems adapted from 
the Sanscrit in the Middle Ages, and 
they often insert passages telling the 
people that they must do their duties. 



n 



I have carried the manuscript of 
these translations about with me for 
days, reading it in railway trains, or 
on the tops of omnibuses and in restaur- 
ants, and I have often had to close 
it lest some stranger would see how 
much it moved me. These lyrics — • 
which are in the original, my Indians 
tell me, full of subtlety of rhythm, of 
untranslatable delicacies of colour, of 
metrical invention — display in their 
thought a world I have dreamed of 
all my life long. The work of a 
supreme culture, they yet appear as 



xiv GITANJALI 

much the growth of the common soil 
as the grass and the rushes. A tradi- 
tion, where poetry and reHgion are 
the same thing, has passed through the 
centuries, gathering from learned and 
unlearned metaphor and emotion, and 
carried back again to the multitude 
the thought of the scholar and of the 
noble. If the civilization of Bengal 
remains unbroken, if that common 
mind which — as one divines — runs 
through all, is not, as with us, broken 
into a dozen minds that know nothing 
of each other, something even of what 
is most subtle in these verses will have 
come, in a few generations, to the 
beggar on the roads. When there 
was but one mind in England Chaucer 
wrote his Troilus and Cressida, and 
though he had written to be read, or 
to be read out — for our time was 
coming on apace — he was sung by 
minstrels for a while. Rabindranath 



INTRODUCTION xv 

Tagore, like Chaucer's forerunners, 
writes music for his words, and one 
understands at every moment that he 
is so abundant, so spontaneous, so 
daring in his passion, so full of surprise, 
because he is doing something which 
has never seemed strange, unnatural, 
or in need of defence. These verses 
will not lie in little well-printed books 
upon ladies' tables, who turn the pages 
with indolent hands that they may 
sigh over a life without meaning, 
which is yet all they can know of life, 
or be carried about by students at the 
university to be laid aside when the 
work of life begins, but as the genera- 
tions pass, travellers will hum them 
on the highway and men rowing upon 
rivers. Lovers, while they await one 
another, shall find, in murmuring them, 
this love of God a magic gulf wherein 
their own more bitter passion may 
bathe and renew its youth. At every 



xvi GITANJALI 

moment the heart of this poet flows 
outward to these without derogation or 
condescension, for it has known that 
they will understand; and it has filled 
itself with the circumstance of their 
lives. The traveller in the red-brown 
clothes that he wears that dust may 
not show upon him, the girl searching 
in her bed for the petals fallen from 
the wreath of her royal lover, the 
servant or the bride awaiting the 
master's home-coming in the empty 
house, are images of the heart turning 
to God. Flowers and rivers, the 
blowing of conch shells, the heavy rain 
of the Indian July, or the parching 
heat, are images of the moods of that 
heart in union or in separation; and 
a man sitting in a boat upon a river 
playing upon a lute, like one of those 
figures full of mysterious meaning in 
a Chinese picture, is God Himself. 
A whole people, a whole civilization. 



INTRODUCTION xvii 

immeasurably strange to us, seems to 
have been taken up into this imagina- 
tion; and yet we are not moved be- 
cause of its strangeness, but because 
we have met our own image, as though 
we had walked in Rossetti's willow 
wood, or heard, perhaps for the first 
time in literature, our voice as in a 
dream. 

Since the Renaissance the writing of 
European saints — however familiar 
their metaphor and the general struc- 
ture of their thought — has ceased to 
hold our attention. We know that we 
must at last forsake the world, and we 
are accustomed in moments of weari- 
ness or exaltation to consider a volun- 
tary forsaking; but how can we, who 
have read so much poetry, seen so many 
paintings, listened to so much music, 
where the cry of the flesh and the cry 
of the soul seem one, forsake it harshly 
and rudely? What have we in common 



xviii GITANJALI 

with St. Bernard covering his eyes that 
they may not dwell upon the beauty of 
the lakes of Switzerland, or with the 
violent rhetoric of the Book of Revela- 
tion? We would, if we might, find, 
as in this book, words full of courtesy. 
"I have got my leave. Bid me fare- 
well, my brothers! I bow to you all 
and take my departure. Here I give 
back the keys of my door — and I give 
up all claims to my house. I only ask 
for last kind words from you. We 
were neighbours for long, but I received 
more than I could give. Now the day 
has dawned and the lamp that lit my 
dark corner is out. A summons has 
come and I am ready for my journey." 
And it is our own mood, when it is 
furthest from A Kempis or John of the 
Cross, that cries, "And because I love 
this life, I know I shall love death 
as well." Yet it is not only in our 
thoughts of the parting that this book 



INTRODUCTION xix 

fathoms all. We had not known that 
we loved God, hardly it may be that 
we believed in Him; yet looking back- 
ward upon our life we discover, in our 
exploration of the pathways of woods, 
in our delight in the lonely places of 
hills, in that mysterious claim that we 
have made, unavailingly, on the women 
that we have loved, the emotion that 
created this insidious sweetness. "En- 
tering my heart unbidden even as 
one of the common crowd, unknown 
to me, my king, thou didst press the 
signet of eternity upon many a fleet- 
ing moment," This is no longer the 
sanctity of the cell and of the scourge; 
being but a lifting up, as it were, into a 
greater intensity of the mood of the 
painter, painting the dust and the sun- 
light, and we go for a like voice to St. 
Francis and to William Blake who 
have seemed so alien in our violent 
history. 



XX GITANJALI 



III 

We write long books where no 
page perhaps has any quality to make 
writing a pleasure, being confident in 
some general design, just as we fight 
and make money and fill our heads 
with politics — all dull things in the 
doing — while Mr. Tagore, like the 
Indian civilization itself, has been con- 
tent to discover the soul and surrender 
himself to its spontaneity. He often 
seems to contrast his life with that of 
those who have lived more after our 
fashion, and have more seeming weight 
in the world, and always humbly as 
though he were only sure his way is 
best for him: "Men going home glance 
at me and smile and fill me with 
shame. I sit like a beggar maid, draw- 
ing my skirt over my face, and when 
they ask me, what it is I want, I drop 



. INTRODUCTION xxi 

my eyes and answer them not.*' At 
another time, remembering how his Hfe 
had once a different shape, he will say, 
"Many an hour have I spent in the 
strife of the good and the evil, but now 
it is the pleasure of my playmate of 
the empty days to draw my heart on 
to him; and I know not why is this 
sudden call to what useless inconse- 
quence." An innocence, a simplicity 
that one does not find elsewhere in 
literature makes the birds and the 
leaves seem as near to him as they are 
near to children, and the changes of 
the seasons great events as before our 
thoughts had arisen between them and 
us. At times I wonder if he has it 
from the literature of Bengal or from 
religion, and at other times, remember- 
ing the birds alighting on his brother's 
hands, I find pleasure in thinking it 
hereditary, a mystery that was growing 
through the centuries like the courtesy 



xxii GITANJALI 

of a Tristan or a Pelanore. Indeed, 
when lie is speaking of children, so 
much a part of himself this quality 
seems, one is not certain that he is not 
also speaking of the saints, **They build 
their houses with sand and they play 
with empty shells. With withered 
leaves they weave their boats and 
smilingly float them on the vast deep. 
Children have their play on the sea- 
shore of worlds. They know not how 
to swim, they know not how to cast 
nets. Pearl fishers dive for pearls, 
merchants sail in their ships, while 
children gather pebbles and scatter 
them again. They seek not for hidden 
treasures, they know not how to cast 
nets." 

W. B. YEATS. 
September 1912. 



CONTENTS 

PAOES 

GiTANJALI . . . . . . 1-95 

Fruit-Gathebing 97-221 



ILLUSTRATIONS IN COLOUR 



Frontispiece. 

The rain has held back for days 

On the slope of the desolate river 

Deliverance is not for me in renunciation 

This autumn morning is tired with excess of light 

The bird of the morning sings .... 

The pain was great when the strings were being 

tuned, my master ! . . . , 
O the waves, the sky-devouring waves 



FACING PAGE 



SO 

58 

68 

lSd6 

128 

166 
196 



XXV 



ILLUSTRATIONS IN BLACK AND 
WHITE 



you 



well 



FACING PAGE 
G 
8 

10 
12 
18 
24 
36 
48 
52 



ord 



My Song has put off her adoraments 

Leave this chanting and singing 

Here is thy footstool 

The song that I came to sing . 

Art thou abroad on this stormy night 

Prisoners, tell me, who was it that bound 

Have you not heard his silent steps . 

I asked nothing from thee 

When I bring to you coloured toys . 

Thou art the sky and thou art the nest as 

I am like a remnant of a cloud 

^^^len I go from hence let this be my parting w 

Ever in my life have I sought thee with my songs 

Is summer's festival only for fresh blossoms and not 

also for withered leaves and faded flowers ? 
I brought out my earthen lamp 
Make me thy poet, O Night, Veiled Night 
A smile of mirth spread over the sky 
The trumpet lies in the dust .... 
The wall breaks asunder, light, like divine laughter, 

bursts in . . . . . . 

I cling to this living raft, my body . 
She is still a child .... 

Maybe there is one house in this city 

The spring with its leaves and flowers has come into 

my body 200 

xxvii 



74 

88' 

92 

100 
118 
122 
134 
142 

152 
156 

182 
190 



GITANJALI 



Thou hast made me endless, such is 
thy pleasure. This frail vessel thou 
emptiest again and again, and fiUest it 
ever with fresh life. 

This little flute of a reed thou hast 
carried over hills and dales, and hast 
breathed through it melodies eternally 
new. 

At the immortal touch of thy hands 
my little heart loses its limits in joy 
and gives birth to utterance ineffable. 

Thy infinite gifts come to me only 
on these very small hands of mine. 
Ages pass, and still thou pourest, and 
still there is room to fill. 



GITANJALI 



When thou commandest me to sing 
it seems that my heart would break 
with pride; and I look to thy face, and 
tears come to my eyes. 

All that is harsh and dissonant in 
my life melts into one sweet harmony 
— and my adoration spreads wings like 
a glad bird on its flight across the sea. 

I know thou takest pleasure in my 
singing. I know that only as a singer 
I come before thy presence. 

I touch by the edge of the far spread- 
ing wing of my song thy feet which I 
could never aspire to reach. 

Drunk with the joy of singing I for- 
get myself and call thee friend who art 
my lord. 



GITANJALI 



I KNOW not how thou singest, my 
master! I ever Hsten in silent amaze- 
ment. 

The light of thy music illumines the 
world. The life breath of thy music 
runs from sky to sky. The holy stream 
of thy music breaks through all stony 
obstacles and rushes on. 

My heart longs to join in thy song, 
but vainly struggles for a voice. I 
would speak, but speech breaks not into 
song, and I cry out baffled. Ah, thou 
hast made my heart captive in the end- 
less meshes of thy music, my master! 

4 

Life of my life, I shall ever try to 
keep my body pure, knowing that thy 
living touch is upon all my limbs. 
I shall ever try to keep all untruths 



4 GITANJALI 

out from my thoughts, knowing that 
thou art that truth which has kindled 
the light of reason in my mind. 

I shall ever try to drive all evils away 
from my heart and keep my love in 
flower, knowing that thou hast thy seat 
in the inmost shrine of my heart. 

And it shall be my endeavour to 
reveal thee in my actions, knowing it 
is thy power gives me strength to act. 



I ASK for a moment's indulgence to sit 
by thy side. The works that I have 
in hand I will finish afterwards. 

Away from the sight of thy face my 
heart knows no rest nor respite, and 
my work becomes an endless toil in a 
shoreless sea of toil. 

To-day the summer has come at my 
window with its sighs and murmurs; 



GITANJALI 5 

and the bees are plying their minstrelsy 
at the court of the flowering grove. 

Now it is time to sit quiet, face to 
face with thee, and to sing dedication 
of life in this silent and overflowing 
leisure. 



6 

Pluck this little flower and take it, 
delay not! I fear lest it droop and 
drop into the dust. 

It may not find a place in thy gar- 
land, but honour it with a touch of 
pain from thy hand and pluck it. I 
feai lest the day end before I am 
aware, and the time of offering go by. 

Though its colour be not deep and 
its smell be faint, use this flower in 
thy service and pluck it while there 
is time. 



GITANJALI 



My song has put off her adornments. 
She has no pride of dress and decora- 
tion. Ornaments would mar our union; 
they would come between thee and 
me; their jingling would drown thy 
whispers. 

My poet's vanity dies in shame before 
thy sight. O master poet, I have sat 
dowTi at thy feet. Only let me make 
my life simple and straight, like a flute 
of reed for thee to fill with music. 



8 

The child who is decked with prince's 
robes and who has jewelled chains 
round his neck loses all pleasure in his 
play; his dress hampers him at every 
step. 

In fear that it may be frayed, or 



Dmirn by Xaiidalal Bose 
My song has put off her adornments 



GITANJALI 7 

stained with dust he keeps himself from 
the world, and is afraid even to move. 

Mother, it is no gain, thy bondage of 
finery, if it keep one shut off from the 
healthful dust of the earth, if it rob 
one of the right of entrance to the 
great fair of common human life. 



9 

O FOOL, to try to carry thyself upon 
thy own shoulders ! O beggar, to come 
to beg at thy own door! 

Leave all thy burdens on his hands 
who can bear all, and never look behind 
in regTet. 

Thy desire at once puts out the light 
from the lamp it touches with its breath. 
It is unholy — take not thy gifts through 
its unclean hands. Accept only what 
is offered by sacred love. 



8 GITANJALI 

10 

Here is thy footstool and there rest 
thy feet where live the poorest, and 
lowliest, and lost. 

When I try to bow to thee, my 
obeisance cannot reach down to the 
depth where thy feet rest among the 
poorest, and lowliest, and lost. 

Pride can never approach to where 
thou walkest in the clothes of the 
humble among the poorest, and low- 
liest, and lost. 

My heart can never find its way to 
where thou keepest company with the 
companionless among the poorest, the 
lowliest, and the lost, v-' 

11 

Leave this chanting and singing and 
telling of beads! Whom dost thou 
worship in this lonely dark corner of a 




Painted by Nandalal Base 
Leave this chanting and singing 



GITANJALI 9 

temple with doors all shut? Open 
thine eyes and see thy God is not before 
thee! 

He is there where the tiller is tilling 
the hard ground and where the path- 
maker is breaking stones. He is with 
them in sun and in shower, and his 
garment is covered with dust. Put off 
thy holy mantle and even like him come 
down on the dusty soil! 

Deliverance.^ Where is this deliver- 
ance to be found .^ Our master himself 
has joyfully taken upon him the bonds 
of creation; he is bound with us all for 
ever. 

Come out of thy meditations and 
leave aside thy flowers and incense! 
WTiat harm is there if thy clothes 
become tattered and stained? Meet 
him and stand by him in toil and in 
sweat of thy brow. 



10 GITANJALI 

n 

The time that my journey takes is long 
and the way of it long. 

I came out on the chariot of the first 
gleam of light, and pursued my voyage 
through the wildernesses of worlds leav- 
ing my track on many a star and planet. 

It is the most distant course that 
comes nearest to thyself, and that 
training is the most intricate which 
leads to the utter simplicity of a tune. 

The traveller has to knock at every 
alien door to come to his own, and one 
has to wander through all the outer 
worlds to reach the innermost shrine 
at the end. 

My eyes strayed far and wide before 
I shut them and said "Here art thou!" 

The question and the cry *'0h, 
where?" melt into tears of a thousand 
streams and deluge the world with the 
flood of the assurance "I am!" 



Painted by Surcmlninath Kur 

Here is thy footstool 



GITANJALI 11 



13 



The song that I came to sing remains 
unsung to this day. 

I have spent my days in stringing 
and in unstringing my instrument. 

The time has not come true, the 
words have not been rightly set; only 
there is the agony of wishing in my 
heart. 

The blossom has not opened; only 
the wind is sighing by. 

I have not seen his face, nor have I 
listened to his voice; only I have heard 
his gentle footsteps from the road be- 
fore my house. 

The livelong day has passed in 
spreading his seat on the floor; but the 
lamp has not been lit and I cannot ask 
him into my house. 

I live in the hope of meeting with 
him; but this meeting is not yet. 



U GITANJALI 



14 



My desires are many and my cry is 
pitiful, but ever didst thou save me by 
hard refusals; and this strong mercy 
has been wrought into my life through 
and through. 

Day by day thou art making me 
worthy of the simple, great gifts that 
thou gavest to me unasked — this sky 
and the light, this body and the life 
and the mind — saving me from perils 
of overmuch desire. 

There are times when I languidly 
linger and times when I awaken and 
hurry in search of my goal; but cruelly 
thou hidest thyself from before me. 

Day by day thou art making me 
worthy of thy full acceptance by refus- 
ing me ever and anon, saving me from 
perils of weak, uncertain desire. 




Drawn by Nandalal Bone 
The Song that I came to sing 



GITANJALI 13 

15 

I AM here to sing thee songs. In this 
hall of thine I have a corner seat. 

In thy world I have no work to do; 
my useless life can only break out in 
tunes without a purpose. 

When the hour strikes for thy silent 
worship at dark temple of midnight, 
command me, my master, to stand 
before thee to sing. 

When in the morning air the golden 
harp is tuned, honour me, commanding 
my presence. 

16 

I HAVE had my invitation to this world's 
festival, and thus my life has been 
blessed. My eyes have seen and my 
ears have heard. 

It was my part at this feast to play 
upon my instrument, and I have done 
all I could. 



14 GITANJALI 

Now, I ask, has the time come at 
last when I may go in and see thy face 
and offer thee my silent salutation? 

17 

I AM only waiting for love to give 
myself up at last into his hands. That 
is why it is so late and why I have 
been guilty of such omissions. 

They come with their laws and their 
codes to bind me fast; but I evade 
them ever, for I am only waiting for 
love to give myself up at last into his 
hands. 

People blame me and call me heed- 
less; I doubt not they are right in their 
blame. 

The market day is over and work is 
all done for the busy. Those who came 
to call me in vain have gone back in 
anger. I- am only waiting for love to 
give myself up at last into his hands. 



GITANJALI 15 



18 

Clouds heap upon clouds and It 
darkens. Ah, love, why dost thou let 
me wait outside at the door all alone? 

In the busy moments of the noontide 
work I am with the crowd, but on this 
dark lonely day it is only for thee that 
I hope. 

If thou showest me not thy face, if 
thou leavest me wholly aside, I know 
not how I am to pass these long, rainy 
hours. 

I keep gazing on the far away gloom 
of the sky, and my heart wanders wail- 
ing with the restless wind. 

- 19 

If thou speakest not I will fill my 
heart with thy silence and endure it. I 
will keep still and wait like the night 



16 GITANJALI 

with starry vigil and its head bent low 
with patience. 

The morning will surely come, the 
darkness will vanish, and thy voice 
pour down in golden streams breaking 
through the sky. 

Then thy words will take wing in 
songs from every one of my birds' 
nests, and thy melodies will break forth 
in flowers in all my forest groves. 



20 



On the day when the lotus bloomed, 
alas, my mind was straying, and I knew 
it not. My basket was empty and the 
flower remained unheeded. 

Only now and again a sadness fell 
upon me, and I started up from my 
dream and felt a sweet trace of a strange 
fragrance in the south wind. 

That vague sweetness made my heart 
ache with longing and it seemed to me 



GITANJALI 17 

that it was the eager breath of the 
summer seeking for its completion. 

I knew not then that it was so near, 
that it was mine, and that this perfect 
sweetness had blossomed in the depth 
of my own heart. 



21 



I MUST launch out my boat. The 
languid hours pass by on the shore — 
Alas for me! 

The spring has done its flowering and 
taken leave. And now with the burden 
of faded futile flowers I wait and linger. 

The waves have become clamorous, 
and upon the bank in the shady lane the 
yellow leaves flutter and fall. 

What emptiness do you gaze upon! 
Do you not feel a thrill passing through 
the air with the notes of the far away 
song floating from the other shore? 



18 GITANJALI 

In the deep shadows of the rainy July, 
with secret steps, thou walkest, silent 
as night, eluding all watchers. 

To-day the morning has closed its 
eyes, heedless of the insistent calls of 
the loud east wind, and a thick veil has 
been drawn over the ever-wakeful blue 
sky. 

The woodlands have hushed their 
songs, and doors are all shut at every 
house. Thou art the solitary wayfarer 
in this deserted street. Oh my only 
friend, my best beloved, the gates are 
open in my house — do not pass by like 
a dream. 

23 

Art thou abroad on this stormy night 
on the journey of love, my friend .^^ The 
sky groans like one in despair. 

I have no sleep to-night. Ever and 




Painted by Xanclalal Bosc 

Art thou abroad on this stormy night? 



GITAXJALI 19 

again I open my door and look out on 
tlie darkness, my friend! 

I can see nothing before me. I 
wonder where Hes thy path ! 

Bv what dim shore of the ink-black 
river, by what far edge of the frowning 
forest, through what mazy depth of 
gloom art thou threading thy course 
to come to me, mv friend? 



24 

If the day is done, if birds sing no 
more, if the wind has flagged tired, 
then draw the veil of darkness thick 
upon me, even as thou hast WTapt the 
earth with the coverlet of sleep and 
tenderly closed the petals of the droop- 
ing lotus at dusk. 

From the traveller, whose sack of 
provisions is empty before the voyage 
is ended, whose garment is torn and 
dust-laden, whose strength is ex- 



20 GITANJALI 

hausted, remove shame and poverty, 
and renew his Hfe like a flower under 
the cover of thy kindly night. 

25 

In the night of weariness let me give 
myself up to sleep without struggle, 
resting my trust upon thee. 

Let me not force my flagging spirit 
into a poor preparation for thy worship. 

It is thou who drawest the veil of 
night upon the tired eyes of the day to 
renew its sight in a fresher gladness of 
awakening. 

26 

He came and sat by my side but I 
woke not. What a cursed sleep it was, 
O miserable me! 

He came when the night was still; 
he had his harp in his hands, and 
my dreams became resonant with its 
melodies. 



GITANJALI 21 

Alas, why are my nights all thus 
lost? Ah, why do I ever miss his 
sight whose breath touches my sleep? 



27 

Light, oh where is the light? Kindle 
it with the burning fire of desire! 

There is the lamp but never a flicker 
of a flame, — is such thy fate, my heart ! 
Ah, death were better by far for thee! 

Misery knocks at thy door, and her 
message is that thy lord is wakeful, and 
he calls thee to thy love-tryst through 
the darkness of night. 

The sky is overcast with clouds and 
the rain is ceaseless. I know not what 
this is that stirs in me, — I know not its 
meaning. 

A moment's flash of lightning drags 
down a deeper gloom on my sight, and 
my heart gropes for the path to where 
the music of the night calls me. 



22 GITANJALI 

Light, oh where is the light! Kindle 
it with the burning fire of desire! It 
thunders and the wind rushes screaming 
through the void. The night is black 
as a black stone. Let not the hours 
pass by in the dark. Kindle the lamp 
of love with thy life. 



28 

Obstinate are the trammels, but my 
heart aches when I try to break them. 

Freedom is all I want, but to hope 
for it I feel ashamed. 

I am certain that priceless wealth is 
in thee, and that thou art my best 
friend, but I have not the heart to 
sweep away the tinsel that fills my 
room. 

The shroud that covers me is a 
shroud of dust and death; I hate it, 
yet hug it in love. 

My debts are large, my failures great, 



GITANJALI 23 

my shame secret and heavy; yet when 
I come to ask for my good, I quake in 
fear lest my prayer be granted. 



29 

He whom I enclose with my name is 
weeping in this dungeon. I am ever 
busy building this wall all around; and 
as this wall goes up into the sky day 
by day I lose sight of my true being in 
its dark shadow. 

I take pride in this great wall, and I 
plaster it with dust and sand lest a least 
hole should be left in this name; and 
for all the care I take I lose sight of 
my true being. 



30 

I CAME out alone on my way to my 
tryst. But who is this that follows me 
in the silent dark.'' 



24 GITANJALI 

I move aside to avoid his presence 
but I escape liim not. 

He makes the dust rise from the 
earth with his swagger; he adds his 
loud voice to every word that I utter. 

lie is my own little self, my lord, 
he knows no shame; but I am ashamed 
to come to thy door in his company. 



31 



"Prisoner, tell me, who was it that 
bound you.'*" 

" It was my master, "said the prisoner. 
*'I thought I could outdo everybody in 
the world in wealth and power, and I 
amassed in my own treasure-house the 
money due to my king. When sleep 
overcame me I lay upon the bed that 
was for my lord, and on waking up I 
found I was a prisoner in my own 
treasure-house. " 



% 




^ 



Painted by Abanindranath Tagorc 
Prisoners, tell me, who was it that bound you? 



GITANJALI 25 

"Prisoner, tell me who was it that 
wrought this unbreakable chain?" 

"It was I," said the prisoner, "who 
forged this chain very carefully. I 
thought my invincible power would 
hold the world captive leaving me in a 
freedom undisturbed. Thus night and 
day I worked at the chain with huge 
fires and cruel hard strokes. When at 
last the work was done and the links 
were complete and unbreakable, I 
found that it held me in its grip." 



By all means they try to hold me 
secure who love me in this world. But 
it is otherwise with thy love which is 
greater than theirs, and thou keepest 
me free. 

Lest I forget them they never venture 
to leave me alone. But day passes by 
after day and thou art not seen. 



26 GITANJALI 

If I call not thee in my prayers, if I 
keep not thee in my heart, thy love for 
me still waits for my love. 



When it was day they came into my 
house and said, "We shall only take 
the smallest room here." 

They said, "We shall help you in the 
worship of your God and humbly accept 
only our own share of his grace"; and 
then they took their seat in a corner 
and they sat quiet and meek. 

But in the darkness of night I find 
they break into my sacred shrine, strong 
and turbulent, and snatch with unholy 
greed the offerings from God's altar. 



34 

Let only that little be left of me 
whereby I may name thee my all. 



GITANJALI 27 

Let only that little be left of my will 
whereby I may feel thee on every side, 
and come to thee in everything, and 
offer to thee my love every moment. 

Let only that little be left of me 
whereby I may never hide thee. 

Let only that little of my fetters be 
left whereby I am bound with thy will, 
and thy purpose is carried out in my 
life — and that is the fetter of thy love. 



35 

Where the mind is without fear and 
the head is held high; 

Where knowledge is free; 

Where the world has not been broken 
up into fragments by narrow domestic 
walls; 

Where words come out from the 
depth of truth; 

Where tireless striving stretches its 
arms towards perfection; 



28 GITANJALI 

Where the clear stream of reason has 
not lost its way into the dreary desert 
sand of dead habit; 

Where the mind is led forward by 
thee into ever-widening thought and 
action — 

Into that heaven of freedom, my 
Father, let my country awake. 



36 

This is my prayer to thee, my lord — 
strike, strike at the root of penury in 
my heart. 

Give me the strength lightly to bear 
my joys and sorrows. 

Give me the strength to make my 
love fruitful in service. 

Give me the strength never to disown 
the poor or bend my knees before 
insolent might. 

Give me the strength to raise my 
mind high above daily trifles. 



GITANJALI 29 

And give me the strength to surrender 
my strength to thy will with love. 

37 

I THOUGHT that my voyage had come 
to its end at the last limit of my power, 
— that the path before me was closed, 
that provisions were exhausted and the 
time come to take shelter in a silent 
obscurity. 

But I find that thy will knows no 
end in me. And when old words die 
out on the tongue, new melodies break 
forth from the heart; and where the 
old tracks are lost, new country is 
revealed with its wonders. 

38 

That I want thee, only thee — let my 
heart repeat without end. All desires 
that distract me, day and night, are 
false and empty to the core. 



30 GITANJALI 

As the night keeps hidden in its 
gloom the petition for light, even thus 
in the depth of my unconsciousness 
rings the cry — I want thee, only thee. 

As the storm still seeks its end in 
peace when it strikes against peace 
with all its might, even thus my rebel- 
lion strikes against thy love and still its 
cry is — I want thee, only thee. 



When the heart is hard and parched 
up, come upon me with a shower of 
mercy. 

When grace is lost from life, come 
with a burst of song. 

When tumultuous work raises its din 
on all sides shutting me out from be- 
yond, come to me, my lord of silence, 
with thy peace and rest. 

When my beggarly heart sits 
crouched, shut up in a corner, break 







*> ;: 



V 

^ 



GITANJALI 31 

open the door, my king, and come with 
the ceremony of a king. 

When desire blinds the mind with 
dehision and dust, thou holy one, 
thou wakeful, come with thy light and 
thy thunder. 



40 

The rain has held back for days and 
days, my God, in my arid heart. The 
horizon is fiercely naked — not the thin- 
nest cover of a soft cloud, not the 
vaguest hint of a distant cool shower. 

Send thy angry storm, dark with 
death, if it is thy wish, and with lashes 
of lightning startle the sky from end to 
end. 

But call back, my lord, call back 
this pervading silent heat, still and keen 
and cruel, burning the heart with dire 
despair. 

Let the cloud of grace bend low from 



32 GITANJALI 

above like the tearful look of the mother 
on the day of the father's wrath. 



41 

Where dost thou stand behind them 
all, my lover, hiding thyself in the 
shadows? They push thee and pass 
thee by on the dusty road, taking thee 
for naught. I wait here weary hours 
spreading my offerings for thee, while 
passers by come and take my flowers, 
one by one, and my basket is nearly 
empty. 

The morning time is past, and the 
noon* In the shade of evening my 
eyes are drowsy with sleep. Men going 
home glance at me and smile and fill 
me with shame. I sit like a beggar 
maid, drawing my skirt over my face, 
and when they ask me, what it is I 
want, I drop my eyes and answer them 
not. 



GITANJALI 33 

Oh, how, indeed, could I tell them 
that for thee I wait, and that thou hast 
promised to come. How could I utter 
for shame that I keep for my dowry 
this poverty. Ah, I hug this pride in 
the secret of my heart. 

I sit on the grass and gaze upon the 
sky and dream of the sudden splendour 
of thy coming — all the lights ablaze, 
golden pennons flying over thy car, 
and they at the roadside standing 
agape, when they see thee come 
down from thy seat to raise me from 
the dust, and set at thy side this 
ragged beggar girl a-tremble with 
shame and pride, like a creeper in a 
summer breeze. 

But time glides on and still no sound 
of the wheels of thy chariot. Many a 
procession passes by with noise and 
shouts and glamour of glory. Is it only 
thou who wouldst stand in the shadow 
silent and behind them all? And only I 



34 GITANJALI 

who would wait and weep and wear out 
my heart in vain longing? 



42 

Early in the day it was whispered that 
we should sail in a boat, only thou and 
I, and never a soul in the world would 
know of this our pilgrimage to no 
country and to no end. 

In that shoreless ocean, at thy silently 
listening smile my songs would swell 
in melodies, free as waves, free from all 
bondage of words. 

Is the time not come yet? Are there 
works still to do? Lo, the evening 
has come down upon the shore and in 
the fading light the seabirds come 
flying to their nests. 

Who knows when the chains will be 
off, and the boat, like the last glimmer 
of sunset, vanish into the night? 



GITANJALI 35 



43 



The day was when I did not keep my- 
self in readiness for thee; and entering 
my heart unbidden even as one of the 
common crowd, unknown to me, my 
king, thou didst press the signet of 
eternity upon many a fleeting moment 
of my life. 

And to-day when by chance I light 
upon them and see thy signature, I 
find they have lain scattered in the 
dust mixed with the memory of joys and 
sorrows of my trivial days forgotten. 

Thou didst not turn in contempt 
from my childish play among dust, ^nd 
the steps that I heard in my playroom 
are the same that are echoing from star 
to star. 



36 GITANJALI 

44 

This is my delight, thus to wait and 
watch at the wayside where shadow 
chases light and the rain comes in the 
wake of the summer. 

Messengers, with tidings from un- 
known skies, greet me and speed along 
the road. My heart is glad within, and 
the breath of the passing breeze is 
sweet. 

From dawn till dusk I sit here before 
my door, and I know that of a sudden 
the happy moment will arrive when I 
shall see. 

In the meanwhile I smile and I sing 
all alone. In the meanwhile the air is 
filling with the perfume of promise. 

45 

Have you not heard his silent steps? 
He comes, comes, ever comes. 




Painted by Abanindranalh Tagore 

Have you not heard his silent steps? 



GITANJALI 37 

Every moment and every age, every 
day and every night he comes, comes, 
ever comes. 

Many a song have I sung in many a 
mood of mind, but all their notes have 
always proclaimed, *'He comes, comes, 
ever comes." 

In the fragrant days of sunny April 
through the forest path he comes, 
comes, ever comes. 

In the rainy gloom of July nights on 
the thundering chariot of clouds he 
comes, comes, ever comes. 

In sorrow after sorrow it is his steps 
that press upon my heart, and it is 
the golden touch of his feet that 
makes my joy to shine. 



46 

I KNOW not from what distant time 
thou art ever coming nearer to meet 



38 GITANJALI 

me. Thy sun and stars can never 
keep thee hidden from me for aye. 

In many a morning and eve thy 
footsteps have been heard and thy 
messenger has come within my heart 
and called me in secret. 

I know not why to-day my life is all 
astir, and a feeling of tremulous joy is 
passing through my heart. 

It is as if the time were come to 
wind up my work, and I feel in the air 
a faint smell of thy sweet presence. 



47 

The night is nearly spent waiting for 
him in vain. I fear lest in the morning 
he suddenly come to my door when I 
have fallen asleep wearied out. Oh 
friends, leave the way open to him — 
forbid him not. 

If the sound of his steps does not 
wake me, do not try to rouse me, I 



GITANJALI 39 

pray. I wish not to be called from my 
sleep by the clamorous choir of birds, 
by the riot of wind at the festival of 
morning light. Let me sleep undis- 
turbed even if my lord comes of a 
sudden to my door. 

Ah, my sleep, precious sleep, which 
only waits for his touch to vanish. 
Ah, my closed eyes that would open 
their lids to the light of his smile 
when he stands before me like a dream 
emerging from darkness of sleep. 

Let him appear before my sight as 
the first of all lights and all forms. 
The first thrill of joy to my awakened 
soul let it come from his glance. And 
let my return to myself be immediate 
return to him. 



48 

The morning sea of silence broke into 
ripples of bird songs; and the flowers 



40 GITANJALI 

were all merry by the roadside; and 
the wealth of gold was scattered 
through the rift of the clouds while 
we busily went on our way and paid no 
heed. 

We sang no glad songs nor played; 
we went not to the village for barter; 
we spoke not a word nor smiled; 
we lingered not on the way. We 
quickened our pace more and more as 
the time sped by. 

The sun rose to the mid sky and 
doves cooed in the shade. Withered 
leaves danced and whirled in the hot 
air of noon. The shepherd boy drowsed 
and dreamed in the shadow of the 
banyan tree, and I laid myself down 
by the water and stretched my tired 
limbs on the grass. 

My companions laughed at me in 
scorn; they held their heads high and 
hurried on ; they never looked back nor 
rested; they vanished in the distant blue 



GITANJALI 41 

haze. They crossed many meadows 
and hills, and passed through strange, 
far-away countries. All honour to 
you, heroic host of the interminable 
path! Mockery and reproach pricked 
me to rise, but found no response in 
me. I gave myself up for lost in the 
.depth of a glad humiliation — in the 
shadow of a dim delight. 

The repose of the sun-embroidered 
green gloom slowly spread over my 
heart. I forgot for what I had travelled, 
and I surrendered my mind without 
struggle to the maze of shadows and 
songs. 

At last, when I woke from my 
slumber and opened my eyes, I saw 
thee standing by me, flooding my sleep 
with thy smile. How I had feared 
that the path was long and wearisome, 
and the struggle to reach thee was 
hard! 



42 GITANJALI 

49 

You came down from your throne and 
stood at my cottage door. 

I was singing all alone in a corner, 
and the melody caught your ear. You 
came down and stood at my cottage 
door. 

Masters are many in your hall, and 
songs are sung there at all hours. But 
the simple carol of this novice struck 
at your love. One plaintive little strain 
mingled with the great music of the 
world, and with a flower for a prize you 
came down and stopped at my cottage 
door. 

50 

I HAD gone a-begging from door to 
door in the village path, when thy 
golden chariot appeared in the distance 
like a gorgeous dream and I wondered 
who was this King of all kings! 



GITANJALI 43 

My hopes rose high and methought 
my evil days were at an end, and I 
stood waiting for alms to be given 
unasked and for wealth scattered on 
all sides in the dust. 

The chariot stopped where I stood. 
Thy glance fell on me and thou camest 
down with a smile. I felt that the luck 
of my life had come at last. Then of 
a sudden thou didst hold out thy right 
hand and say "What hast thou to give 
to me?" 

Ah, what a kingly jest was it to open 
thy palm to a beggar to beg! I was 
confused and stood undecided, and then 
from my wallet I slowly took out the least 
little grain of corn and gave it to thee. 

But how great my surprise when at 
the day's end I emptied my bag on the 
floor to find a least little grain of gold 
among the poor heap. I bitterly wept 
and wished that I had had the heart to 
give thee my all. 



44 GITANJALI 

51 

The night darkened. Our day's works 
had been done. We thought that 
the last guest had arrived for the night 
and the doors in the village were all 
shut. Only some said, The king was 
to come. We laughed and said *'No, 
it cannot be!'* 

It seemed there were knocks at the 
door and we said it was nothing but 
the wind. We put out the lamps and 
lay down to sleep. Only some said, 
"It is the messenger!" We laughed 
and said "No, it must be the wind!" 

There came a sound in the dead of 
the night. We sleepily thought it was 
the distant thunder. The earth shook, 
the walls rocked, and it troubled us in 
our sleep. Only some said, it was the 
sound of wheels. We said in a drowsy 
murmur, " No, it must be the rumbling 
of clouds!" 



GITANJALI 45 

The night was still dark when the 
drum sounded. The voice came "Wake 
up ! delay not ! " We pressed our hands 
on our hearts and shuddered with fear. 
Some said, "Lo, there is the king's 
flag!" We stood up on our feet and 
cried "There is no time for delay!" 

The king has come — but where are 
lights, where are wreaths? Where is 
the throne to seat him? Oh, shame! 
Oh utter shame! Where is the hall, 
the decorations? Some one has said, 
"Vain is this cry! Greet him with 
empty hands, lead him into thy rooms 
all bare!" 

Open the doors, let the conch-shells 
be sounded! In the depth of the 
night has come the king of our dark, 
dreary house. The thunder roars in 
the sky. The darkness shudders with 
lightning. Bring out thy tattered 
piece of mat and spread it in the 
courtyard. With the storm has come 



46 GITANJALI 

of a sudden our king of the fearful 
night. 



52 

I THOUGHT I should ask of thee — but 
I dared not — the rose wreath thou 
hadst on thy neck. Thus I waited 
for the morning, when thou didst 
depart, to find a few fragments on the 
bed. And Hke a beggar I searched 
in the dawn only for a stray petal or 
two. 

Ah me, what is it I find? What 
token left of thy love.'^ It is no 
flower, no spices^ no vase of perfumed 
water. It is thy mighty sword, 
flashing as a flame, heavy as a bolt 
of thunder. The young light of 
morning comes through the window 
and spreads itself upon thy bed. The 
morning bird twitters and asks, 
"Woman, what hast thou got?" No, 



GITANJALI 47 

it is no flower, nor spices, nor vase of 
perfumed water — it is thy dreadful 
sword. 

I sit and muse in wonder, what gift 
is this of thinec I can find no place 
where to hide it. I am ashamed to 
wear it, frail as I am, and it hurts me 
when I press it to my bosom. Yet 
shall I bear in my heart this honour 
of the burden of pain, this gift of thine. 

From now there shall be no fear 
left for me in this world, and thou 
shalt be victorious in all my strife. 
Thou hast left death for my companion 
and I shall crown him with my life. 
Thy sword is with me to cut asunder 
my bonds, and there shall be no fear 
left for me in the world. 

From now I leave off all petty 
decorations. Lord of my heart, no 
more shall there be for me waiting and 
weeping in corners, no more coyness 
and sweetness of demeanour. Thou 



48 GITANJALI 

hast given me thy sword for adornment. 
No more doll's decorations for me! 



53 

Beautiful is thy wristlet, decked 
with stars and cunningly wrought in 
myriad-coloured jewels. But more 
beautiful to me thy sword with its 
curve of lightning like the outspread 
wings of the divine bird of Vishnu, 
perfectly poised in the angry red light 
of the sunset. 

It quivers like the one last response 
of life in ecstasy of pain at the final 
stroke of death; it shines like the pure 
flame of being burning up earthly sense 
with one fierce flash. 

Beautiful is thy wristlet, decked 
with starry gems; but thy sword, O 
lord of thunder, is wrought with 
uttermost beauty, terrible to behold 
or to think of. 



'p^P^: 



^w 



'>^ 




Painted by Nandcdal Base 

I asked nothing from thee 



^ 



GITANJALI 49 

54 

I ASKED nothing from thee; I uttered 
not my name to thine ear. When 
thou took'st thy leave I stood silent. 
I was alone by the well where the 
shadow of the tree fell aslant, and 
the women had gone home with their 
brown earthen pitehers full to the 
brim. They eallcd me and shouted, 
"Come with us, the morning is wearing 
on to noon." But T languidly lingered 
awhile lost in the midst of vague 
musings. 

I heard not thy steps as thou camest. 
Thine eyes were sad when they fell 
on me; thy voiee was tired as thou 
spokest low — "Ah, I am a thirsty 
traveller." I started up from my day- 
dreams and poured water from my 
jar on thy joined palms. The leaves 
rustled overhead; the cuckoo, sang 
from the unseen dark, and perfume of 



50 GITANJALI 

babla flowers came from the bend of 
the road. 

I stood speechless with shame when 
my name thou didst ask. Indeed, 
what had I done for thee to keep me 
in remembrance? But the memory 
that I could give water to thee to 
allay thy thirst will cling to my heart 
and enfold it in sweetness. The 
morning hour is late, the bird sings 
in weary notes, neem leaves rustle 
overhead and I sit and think and 
think. 

55 

Languor is upon your heart and the 
slumber is still on your eyes. 

Has not the word come to you that 
the flower is reigning in splendour 
among thorns .^^ Wake, oh awaken! 
Let not the time pass in vain ! 

At the end of the stony path, in 
the country of virgin solitude my 



GITANJALI 51 

friend is sitting all alone. Deceive 
him not. Wake, oh awaken! 

What if the sky pants and trembles 
with the heat of the midday sun — what 
if the burning sand spreads its mantle 
of thirst — 

Is there no joy in the deep of your 
heart .^^ At every footfall of yours, 
will not the harp of the road break 
out in sweet music of pain? 



56 

Thus it is that thy joy in me is so 
full. Thus it is that thou hast come 
down to me. O thou lord of all 
heavens, where would be thy love if I 
were not? 

Thou hast taken me as thy partner 
of all this wealth. In my heart is the 
endless play of thy delight. In my life 
thy will is ever taking shape. 

And for this, thou who art the King 



52 GITANJALI 

of kings hast decked thyself in beauty 
to captivate my heart. And for this 
thy love loses itself in the love of thy 
lover, and there art thou seen in the 
perfect union of two. 



57 

Light, my light, the world-filling light, 
the eye-kissing light, heart-sweetening 
light! 

Ah, the light dances, my darling, at 
the centre of my life; the light strikes, 
my darling, the chords of my love; the 
sky opens, the wind runs wild, laughter 
passes over the earth. 

The butterflies spread their sails on 
the sea of light. Lilies and jasmines 
surge up on the crest of the waves of 
light. 

The light is shattered into gold on 
every cloud, my darling, and it scatters 
gems in profusion. 



GITANJALI 53 

Mirth spreads from leaf to leaf, my 
darling, and gladness without measure. 
The heaven's river has drowned its 
banks and the flood of joy is abroad. 

58 

Let all the strains of joy mingle in my 
last song — the joy that makes the earth 
flow over in the riotous excess of the 
grass, the joy that sets the twin broth- 
ers, life and death, dancing over the 
wide world, the joy that sweeps in with 
the tempest, shaking and waking all life 
with laughter, the joy that sits still with 
its tears on the open red lotus of pain, 
and the joy that throws everything it 
has upon the dust, and knows not a 
word. 

59 

Yes, I know, this is nothing but thy 
love,0 beloved of my heart — this golden 



54 GITANJALI 

light that dances upon the leaves, these 
idle clouds sailing across the sky, this 
passing breeze leaving its coolness upon 
my forehead. 

The morning light has flooded my 
eyes — this is thy message to my heart. 
Thy face is bent from above, thy eyes 
look down on my eyes, and my heart 
has touched thy feet. 



60 



On the seashore of endless worlds 
children meet. The infinite sky is 
motionless overhead and the restless 
water is boisterous. On the seashore 
of endless worlds the children meet 
with shouts and dances. 

They build their houses with sand 
and they play with empty shells. AYith 
withered leaves they weave their boats 
and smilini2:lv iloat them on the vast 



GITANJALI 55 

deep. Children have their play on the 
seashore of worlds. 

They know not how to swim, they 
know not how to cast nets. Pearl 
fishers dive for pearls, merchants sail in 
their ships, while children gather peb- 
bles and scatter them again. They seek 
not for hidden treasures, they know not 
how to cast nets. 

The sea surges up with laughter and 
pale gleams the smile of the sea beach. 
Death-dealing waves sing meaningless 
ballads to the children, even like a 
mother while rocking her baby's cradle. 
The sea plays with children, and pale 
gleams the smile of the sea beach. 

On the seashore of endless worlds 
children meet. Tempest roams in the 
pathless sky, ships get wrecked in the 
trackless water, death is abroad and 
children play. On the seashore of end- 
less worlds is the great meeting of 
children. 



56 GITANJALI 

61 

The sleep that flits on baby's eyes — • 
does anybody know from where it 
comes? Yes, there is a rumour that 
it has its dwelling where, in the fairy 
village among shadows of the forest 
dimly lit with glow-worms, there hang 
two timid buds of enchantment. From 
there it comes to kiss baby's eyes. 

The smile that flickers on baby's lips 
when he sleeps — does anybody know 
where it was born.^ Yes, there is a 
rumour that a young pale beam of a 
crescent moon touched the edge of a 
vanishing autumn cloud, and there the 
smile was first born in the dream of a 
dew-washed morning — the smile that 
flickers on baby's lips when he sleeps. 

The sweet, soft freshness that blooms 
on baby's limbs — does anybody know 
where it was hidden so long? Yes, 
when the mother was a young girl it 



GITANJALI 57 

lay pervading her heart in tender and 
silent mystery of love — the sweet, soft 
freshness that has bloomed on baby's 
limbs. 

When I bring to you coloured toys, 
my child, I understand why there is 
such a play of colours on clouds, on 
water, and why flowers are painted in 
tints — when I give coloured toys to 
you, my child. 

When I sing to make you dance I 
truly know why there is music in leaves, 
and why waves send their chorus of 
voices to the heart of the listening 
earth — when I sing to make you dance. 

When I bring sweet things to your 
greedy hands I know why there is 
honey in the cup of the flower and why 
fruits are secretly filled with sweet juice 
— when I bring sweet things to your 
greedy hands. 



58 GITANJALI 

When I kiss your face to make you 
smile, my darling, I surely understand 
what the pleasure is that streams from 
the sky in morning light, and what 
delight that is which the summer breeze 
brings to my body — when I kiss you to 
make you smile. 

63 

Thou hast made me known to friends 
whom I knew not. Thou hast given 
me seats in homes not my own. Thou 
hast brought the distant near and 
made a brother of the stranger. 

I am uneasy at heart when I have to 
leave my accustomed shelter; I forget 
that there abides the old in the new, 
and that there also thou abidest. 

Through birth and death, in this 
world or in others, wherever thou 
leadest me it is thou, the same, the 
one companion of my endless life who 




Painted by Siirendrunulh Kur 

On the slope of the desolate river 



GITANJALI 59 

ever linkest my heart with bonds of 
joy to the unfamiliar. 

When one knows thee, then alien 
there is none, then no door is shut. 
Oh, grant me my prayer that I may 
never lose the bliss of the touch of the 
one in the play of the many. 



64 

On the slope of the desolate river among 
tall grasses I asked her, "Maiden, where 
do you go shading your lamp with your 
mantle? My house is all dark and 
lonesome — lend me your light!" She 
raised her dark eyes for a moment and 
looked at my face through the dusk. 
*'I have come to the river," she said, 
"to float my lamp on the stream when 
the daylight wanes in the west." I 
stood alone among tall grasses and 
watched the timid flame of her lamp 
uselessly drifting in the tide. 



60 GITANJALI 

In the silence of gathering night 1 
asked her, "Maiden, your Hghts are all 
lit — then where do you go with your 
lamp? My house is all dark and lone- 
some, — lend me your light." She raised 
her dark eyes on my face and stood for 
a moment doubtful. "I have come," 
she said at last, "to dedicate my lamp 
to the sky." I stood and watched her 
light uselessly burning in the void. 

In the moonless gloom of midnight I 
asked her, "Maiden, what is your quest 
holding the lamp near your heart .'^ My 
house is all dark and lonesome, — lend 
me your light." She stopped for a 
minute and thought and gazed at my 
face in the dark. "I have brought my 
light," she said, "to join the carnival of 
lamps." I stood and watched her little 
lamp uselessly lost among lights. 



GITANJALI 61 

65 

What divine drink wouldst thou have, 
my God, from this overflowing cup of 
my life? 

My poet, is it thy delight to see thy 
creation through my eyes and to stand 
at the portals of my ears silently to 
listen to thine own eternal harmony? 

Thy world is weaving words in my 
mind and thy joy is adding music to 
them. Thou givest thyself to me in 
love and then feelest thine own entire 
sweetness in me. 

66 

She wTio ever had remained in the 
depth of my being, in the twilight of 
gleams and of glimpses; she who never 
opened her veils in the morning light, 
will be my last gift to thee, my God, 
folded in my final song. 



62 GITANJALI 

Words have wooed yet failed to win 
her; persuasion has stretched to her its 
eager arms in vain. 

I have roamed from country to 
country keeping her in the core of my 
heart, and around her have risen and 
fallen the growth and decay of my life. 

Over my thoughts and actions, my 
slumbers and dreams, she reigned yet 
dwelled alone and apart. 

Many a man knocked at my door 
and asked for her and turned away in 
despair. 

There was none in the world who 
ever saw her face to face, and she 
remained in her loneliness waiting for 
thy recognition. 

67 

Thou art the sky and thou art the nest 
as well. 

O thou beautiful, there in the nest it 










^ 






Painti'd hy Naiulalal Hone 

Thou art tlie sky and thou art the nest as well 



GITANJALI 63 

is thy love that encloses the soul with 
colours and sounds and odours. 

There comes the morning with the 
golden basket in her right hand bearing 
the wreath of beauty, silently to crown 
the earth. 

And there comes the evening over 
the lonely meadows deserted by herds, 
through trackless paths, carrying cool 
draughts of peace in her golden pitcher 
from the western ocean of rest. 

But there, where spreads the infinite 
sky for the soul to take her flight in, 
reigns the stainless white radiance. 
There is no day nor night, nor form nor 
colour, and never, never a word. 



68 

Thy sunbeam comes upon this earth of 
mine with arms outstretched and stands 
at my door the livelong day to carry 



64 GITANJALI 

back to thy feet clouds made of my 
tears and sighs and songs. 

With fond dehght thou wrappest 
about thy starry breast that mantle of 
misty cloud, turning it into numberless 
shapes and folds and colouring it with 
hues everchanging. 

It is so light and so fleeting, tender 
and tearful and dark, that is why thou 
lovest it, O thou spotless and serene. 
A.nd that is why it may cover thy 
iwful white light with its pathetic 
shadows. 



69 

The same stream of life that runs 
through my veins night and day runs 
through the world and dances in 
rhythmic measures. 

It is the same life that shoots in joy 
through the dust of the earth in 
numberless blades of grass and breaks 



GITANJALI 65 

into tumultuous waves of leaves and 
flowers. 

It is the same life that is rocked in 
the ocean-cradle of birth and of death, 
in ebb and in flow. 

I feel my limbs are made glorious by 
the touch of this world of life. And my 
pride is from the life-throb of ages 
dancing in my blood this moment. 



70 

Is it beyond thee to be glad with the 
gladness of this rhythm? to be tossed 
and lost and broken in the whirl of this 
fearful joy? 

All things rush on, they stop not, 
they look not behind, no power can 
hold them back, they rush on. 

Keeping steps with that restless, rapid 
music, seasons come dancing and pass 
away — colours, tunes, and perfumes 
pour in endless cascades in the abound- 



66 GITANJALI 

ing joy that scatters and gives up and 
dies every moment. 

71 

That I should make much of myself 
and turn it on all sides, thus casting 
coloured shadows on thy radiance — 
such is thy maya. 

Thou settest a barrier in thine own 
being and then callest thy severed self 
in myriad notes. This thy self-separa- 
tion has taken body in me. 

The poignant song is echoed through 
all the sky in many-coloured tears and 
smiles, alarms and hopes ; waves rise up 
and sink again, dreams break and form. 
In me is thy own defeat of self. 

This screen that thou hast raised is 
painted with innumerable figures with 
the brush of the night and the day. 
Behind it thy seat is woven in wondrous 
mysteries of curves, casting away all 
barren lines of straightness. 



GITANJALI 67 

The great pageant of thee and me 
has overspread the sky. With the 
tune of thee and me all the air is 
vibrant, and all ages pass with the hid- 
ing and seeking of thee and me. 



72 



He it is, the innermost one, who 
awakens my being with his deep hidden 
touches. 

He it is who puts his enchantment 
upon these eyes and joyfully plays on 
the chords of my heart in varied ca- 
dence of pleasure and pain. 

He it is who weaves the web of this 
maya in evanescent hues of gold and 
silver, blue and green, and lets peep out 
through the folds his feet, at whose 
touch I forget myself. 

Days come and ages pass, and it is 
ever he who moves my heart in many a 



68 GITANJALI 

name, in many a guise, in many 
rapture of joy and of sorrow. 



73 



Deliverance is not for me in renuncia- 
tion. I feel the embrace of freedom in 
a thousand bonds of delight. 

Thou ever pourest for me the fresh 
draught of thy wine of various colours 
and fragrance, filling this earthen vessel 
to the brim. 

My world will light its hundred 
different lamps with thy flame and 
place them before the altar of thy 
temple. 

No, I will never shut the doors of 
my senses. The delights of sight and 
hearing and touch will bear thy delight. 

Yes, all my illusions will burn into 
illumination of joy, and all my desires 
ripen into fruits of love. 




Painted by Abanindranafh Togorc 

Deliverance is not for me in renunciation. 



GITANJALI 69 

74 

The day is no more, the sliadow is upon 
the earth. It is time that I go to the 
stream to fill my pitcher. 

The evening air is eager with the sad 
music of the water. Ah, it calls me out 
into the dusk. In the lonely lane there 
is no passer by, the wind is up, the 
ripples are rampant in the river. 

I know not if I shall come back 
home. I know not whom I shall 
chance to meet. There at the fording 
in the little boat the unknown man 
plays upon his lute. 

75 

Thy gifts to us mortals fulfil all our 
needs and yet run back to thee un- 
diminished. 

The river has its everj^day work to 
do and hastens throusrh fields and 



70 GITANJALI 

hamlets ; yet its incessant stream winds 
towards the washing of thy feet. 

The flower sweetens the air with its 
perfume; yet its last service is to offer 
itself to thee. 

Thy worship does not impoverish the 
world. 

From the words of the poet men take 
what meanings please them; yet their 
last meaning points to thee. 



76 



Day after dAY, O lord of my life, shall 
I stand before thee face to face.^ With 
folded hands, O lord of all worlds, shall 
I stand before thee face to face.'' 

Under thy great sky in solitude and 
silence, with humble heart shall I stand 
before thee face to face.'' 

In this laborious w^orld of thine, 
tumultuous with toil and with struggle. 



GITANJALI 71 

among hurrying crowds shall I stand 
before thee face to face? 

And when my work shall be done in 
this world, O King of kings, alone and 
speechless shall I stand before thee 
face to face? 



77 

I KNOW thee as my God and stand 
apart — I do not know thee as my own 
and come closer. I know thee as my 
father and bow before thy feet — I do 
not grasp thy hand as my friend's. 

I stand not where thou comest down 
and ownest thyself as mine, there to 
clasp thee to my heart and take thee as 
my comrade. 

Thou art the Brother amongst my 
brothers, but I heed them not, I divide 
not my earnings with them, thus shar- 
ing my all with thee. 

In pleasure and in pain I stand not 



72 GITANJALI 

by the side of men, and thus stand 
by thee. I shrink to give up my 
life, and thus do not plunge into the 
great waters of life. 



78 

When the creation was new and all 
the stars shone in their first splendour, 
the gods held their assembly in the sky 
and sang "Oh, the picture of perfec- 
tion! the joy unalloyed!" 

But one cried of a sudden — "It seems 
that somewhere there is a break in the 
chain of light and one of the stars has 
been lost." 

The golden string of their harp 
snapped, their song stopped, and they 
cried in dismay — "Yes, that lost star 
was the best, she was the glory of all 
heavens!" 

From that day the search is un- 
ceasing for her, and the cry goes on 



GITANJALI 73 

from one to the other that in her the 
world has lost its one joy! 

Only in the deepest silence of night 
the stars smile and whisper among 
themselves — "Vain is this seeking! 
Unbroken perfection is over all!" 



79 

If it is not my portion to meet thee in 
this my life then let me ever feel that 
I have missed thy sight — let me not 
forget for a moment, let me carry the 
pangs of this sorrow in my dreams and 
in my wakeful hours. 

As my days pass in the crowded 
market of this world and my hands 
grow full with the daily profits, let me 
ever feel that I have gained nothing — 
let me not forget for a moment, let me 
carry the pangs of this sorrow in my 
dreams and in my wakeful hours. 

When I sit by the roadside, tired 



74 GITANJALI 

and panting, when I spread my bed low 
in the dust, let me ever feel that the 
long journey is still before me — let me 
not forget for a moment, let me carry 
the pangs of this sorrow in my dreams 
and in my wakeful hours. 

When my rooms have been decked 
out and the flutes sound and the laugh- 
ter there is loud, let me ever feel that I 
have not invited thee to my house — 
let me not forget for a moment, let me 
carry the pangs of this sorrow in my 
dreams and in my wakeful hours. 

80 

I AM like a remnant of a cloud of 
autumn uselessly roaming in the sky, O 
my sun ever-glorious! Thy touch has 
not yet melted my vapour, making me 
one with thy light, and thus I count 
months and years separated from thee. 
If this be thy wish and if this be thy 









1 

9 






^ 


w 


t 
\ 


1 


\ 






} 


A 








A 


t 






m 




dmm 


i 
i 


mH 



Puiiitrd hij Nandalal Bose 

I am like a remnant of a cloud 



GITANJALI 75 

play, then take this fleeting emptiness 
of mine, paint it with colours, gild it 
with gold, float it on the wanton wind 
and spread it in varied wonders. 

And again when it shall be thy wish 
to end this play at night, I shall melt 
and vanish away in the dark, or it may 
be in a smile of the white morning, in a 
coolness of purity transparent. 



81 



On many an idle day have I grieved 
over lost time. But it is never lost, my 
lord. Thou hast taken every moment 
of my life in thine own hands. 

Hidden in the heart of things thou 
art nourishing seeds into sprouts, buds 
into blossoms, and ripening flowers into 
fruitfulness. 

I was tired and sleeping on my idle 
bed and imagined all work had ceased. 



76 GITANJALI 

In the morning I woke up and found 
my garden full with wonders of flowers. 



82 



Time is endless in thy hands, my lord. 
There is none to count thy minutes. 

Days and nights pass and ages bloom 
and fade like flowers. Thou knowest 
how to wait. 

Thy centuries follow each other 
perfecting a small wild flower. 

We have no time to lose, and having 
no time we must scramble for our 
chances. We are too poor to be late. 

And thus it is that time goes by 
while I give it to every querulous man 
who claims it, and thine altar is empty 
of all offerings to the last. 

At the end of the day I hasten in 
fear lest thy gate be shut; but I find 
that yet there is time. 



GITANJALI 77 

83 

Mother, I shall weave a chain of 
pearls for thy neck with my tears of 
sorrow. 

The stars have wrought their anklets 
of light to deck thy feet, but mine will 
hang upon thy breast. 

Wealth and fame come from thee 
and it is for thee to give or to withhold 
them. But this my sorrow is absolutely 
mine own, and when I bring it to thee 
as my offering thou rewardest me with 
thy grace. 

84 

It is the pang of separation that spreads 
throughout the world and gives birth to 
shapes innumerable in the infinite sky. 
It is this sorrow of separation that 
gazes in silence all night from star to 
star and becomes lyric among rustling 
leaves in rainy darkness of July. 



78 GITANJALI 

It is this overspreading pain that 
deepens into loves and desires, into 
sufferings and joys in human homes; 
and this it is that ever melts and flows 
in songs through my poet's heart. 



85 

When the warriors came out first from 
their master's hall, where had they hid 
their power? AYliere were their ar- 
mour and their arms? 

They looked poor and helpless, and 
the arrows were showered upon them 
on the day they came out from their 
master's hall. 

When the warriors marched back 
again to their master's hall where did 
they hide their power? 

They had dropped the sword and 
dropped the bow and the arrow; peace 
was on their foreheads, and they had 
left the fruits of their life behind them 



GITANJALI 79 

on the day they marched back again to 
their master's hall. 



86 

Death, thy servant, is at my door. 
He has crossed the unknown sea and 
brought thy call to my home. 

The night is dark and my heart is 
fearful — yet I will take up the lamp, 
open my gates and bow to him my 
welcome. It is thy messenger who 
stands at my door. 

I will worship him with folded hands, 
and with tears. I will worship him 
placing at his feet the treasure of my 
heart. 

He will go back with his errand done, 
leaving a dark shadow on my morning; 
and in my desolate home only my 
forlorn self will remain as my last 
offering to thee. 



80 GITANJALI 



87 



In desperate hope I go and search for 
her in all the corners of my room; I 
find her not. 

My house is small and what once has 
gone from it can never be regained. 

But infinite is thy mansion, my lord, 
and seeking her I have come to thy 
door. 

I stand under the golden canopy of 
thine evening sky and I lift my eager 
eyes to thy face. 

I have come to the brink of eternity 
from which nothing can vanish — no 
hope, no happiness, no vision of a face 
seen through tears. 

Oh, dip my emptied life into that 
ocean, plunge it into the deepest full- 
ness. Let me for once feel that lost 
sweet touch in the allness of the uni- 
verse. 



GITANJALI 81 

88 

Deity of the ruined temple! The 
broken strings of Vina sing no more 
your praise. The bells in the evening 
proclaim not your time of worship. 
The air is still and silent about you. 

In your desolate dwelling comes the 
vagrant spring breeze. It brings the 
tidings of flowers — the flowers that for 
your worship are ofl^ered no more. 

Your worshipper of old wanders ever 
longing for favour still refused. In the 
eventide, when fires and shadows min- 
gle with the gloom of dust, he wearily 
comes back to the ruined temple with 
hunger in his heart. 

Many a festival day comes to you 
in silence, deity of the ruined temple. 
Many a night of worship goes away 
with lamp unlit. 

Many new images are built by 
masters of cunning art and carried to 



82 GITANJALI 

the holy stream of oblivion when their 
time is come. 

Only the deity of the ruined temple 
remains unworshipped in deathless 
neglect. 

89 

No more noisy, loud words from me — 
such is my master's will. Henceforth 
I deal in whispers. The speech of my 
heart will be carried on in murmurings 
of a song. 

Men hasten to the King's market. 
All the buyers and sellers are there. 
But I have my untimely leave in the 
middle of the day, in the thick of work. 

Let then the flowers come out in my 
garden, though it is not their timeO 
and let the midday bees strike up their 
lazy hum. 

Full many an hour have I spent in 
the strife of the good and the evil, but 
now it is the pleasure of my playmate 



GITANJALI 83 

of the empty days to draw my heart on 
to him; and I know not why is this 
sudden call to what useless incon- 
sequence! 

90 

On the day when death will knock at 
thy door what wilt thou offer to him? 

Oh, I will set before my guest the 
full vessel of my life — I will never let 
him go with empty hands. 

All the sweet vintage of all my 
autumn days and summer nights, all 
the earnings and gleanings of my busy 
life will I place before him at the close 
of my days when death will knock at 
my door. 

91 

O THOU the last fulfilment of life. Death, 
my death, come and whisper to me! 
Day after day have I kept watch for 



84 GITANJALI 

thee; for thee have I borne the joys 
and pangs of Hfe. 

All that I am, that I have, that I hope 
and all my love have ever flowed to- 
wards thee in depth of secrecy. One 
final glance from thine eyes and my life 
will be ever thine own. 

The flowers have been woven and the 
garland is ready for the bridegroom. 
After the wedding the bride shall leave 
her home and meet her lord alone in the 
solitude of night. 



92 

I KNOW that the day will come when 
my sight of this earth shall be lost, and 
life will take its leave in silence, drawing 
the last curtain over my eyes. 

Yet stars will watch at night, and 
morning rise as before, and hours heave 
like sea waves casting up pleasures and 
pains. 



GITANJALI 85 

When I think of this end of my 
moments, the barrier of the moments 
breaks and I see by the light of death 
thy world with its careless treasures. 
Rare is its lowliest seat, rare is its 
meanest of lives. 

Things that I longed for in vain and 
things that I got — let them pass. Let 
me but truly possess the things that I 
ever spurned and overlooked. 

93 

I HAVE got my leave. Bid me farewell, 
my brothers! I bow to you all and 
take my departure. 

Here I give back the keys of my 
door — and I give up all claims to my 
house. I only ask for last kind words 
from you. 

We were neighbours for long, but I 
received more than I could give. Now 
the day has dawned and the lamp 



86 GITANJALI 

that lit my dark corner is out. A 
summons has come and I am ready 
for my journey. 



94 

At this time of my parting, wish me 
good luck, my friends! The sky is 
flushed with the dawn and my path 
lies beautiful 

Ask not what I have with me to take 
there. I start on my journey with 
empty hands and expectant heart. 

I shall put on my wedding garland. 
Mine is not the red-brown dress of the 
traveller, and though there are dangers 
on the way I have no fear in my mind. 

The evening star will come out when 
niy voyage is done and the plaintive 
notes of the twilight melodies be struck 
up from the King's gateway. 



GITANJALI 87 



95 

I WAS not aware of the moment when 
I first crossed the threshold of this Hfe. 

What was the power that made me 
open out into this vast mystery like a 
bud in the forest at midnight ! 

When in the morning I looked upon 
the light I felt in a moment that I was 
no stranger in this world, that the in- 
scrutable without name and form had 
taken me in its arms in the form of my 
own mother. 

Even so, in death the same unknown 
will appear as ever known to me. And 
because I love this life, I know I shall 
love death as well. 

The child cries out when from the 
right breast the mother takes it away, 
in the very next moment to find in the 
left one its consolation. 



88 GITANJALI 

96 

When I go from hence let this be my 
parting word, that what I have seen is 
unsurpassable. 

I have tasted of the hidden honey of 
this lotus that expands on the ocean of 
light, and thus am I blessed — ^let this 
be my parting word. 

In this playhouse of Infinite forms I 
have had my play and here have I 
caught sight of him that is formless. 

My whole body and my limbs have 
thrilled with his touch who is beyond 
touch; and if the end comes here, let 
it come — let this be my parting word. 

97 

When my play was with thee I never 

questioned who thou wert. I knew nor 

shyness nor fear, my life was boisterous. 

In the early morning thou wouldst 




Drawn by Asit Kumar Ilaldar 
When I go from hence let this be my parting word 



GITANJALI 89 

call me from my sleep like my own 
comrade and lead me rmming from 
glade to glade. 

On those days I never cared to know 
the meaning of songs thou sangest to 
me. Only my voice took up the tunes, 
and my heart danced in their cadence. 

Now, when the playtime is over, 
what is this sudden sight that is come 
upon me? The world with eyes bent 
upon thy feet stands in awe with all its 
silent stars. 

98 

I WILL deck thee with trophies, garlands 
of my defeat. It is never in my power 
to escape unconquered. 

I surely know my pride will go to the 
wall, my life will burst its bonds in ex- 
ceeding pain, and my empty heart will 
sob out in music like a hollow reed, and 
the stone will melt in tears. 

I surely know the hundred petals of 



90 GITANJALI 

a lotus will not remain closed for ever 
and the secret recess of its honey will 
be bared. 

From the blue sky an eye shall gaze 
upon me and summon me in silence. 
Nothing will be left for me, nothing 
whatever, and utter death shall I re- 
ceive at thy feet. 

99 

When I give up the helm I know that 
the time has come for thee to take it. 
What there is to do will be instantly 
done. Vain is this struggle. 

Then take away your hands and 
silently put up with your defeat, my 
heart, and think it your good fortune 
to sit perfectly still where you are 
placed. 

These my lamps are blown out at 
every little puff of wind, and trying to 
light them I forget all else again and 
again. 



GITANJALI 91 

But I shall be wise this time and wait 
in the dark, spreading my mat on the 
floor; and whenever it is thy pleasure, 
my lord, come silently and take thy 
seat here. 



100 

I DIVE down into the depth of the ocean 
of forms, hoping to gain the perfect 
pearl of the formless. 

No more sailing from harbour to 
harbour with this my weather-beaten 
boat. The days are long passed when 
my sport was to be tossed on waves. 

And now I am eager to die into the 
deathless. 

Into the audience hall by the fathom- 
less abyss where swells up the music of 
toneless strings I shall take this harp of 
my life. 

I shall tune it to the notes of for ever, 
and, when it has sobbed out its last 




92 GITANJALI 

utterance, lay down my silent harp at 
the feet of the silent. 



101 

Ever in my life have I sought thee 
with my songs. It was they who led 
me from door to door, and with them 
have I felt about me, searching and 
touching my world. 

It was my songs that taught me all 
the lessons I ever learnt; they showed 
me secret paths, they brought before 
my sight many a star on the horizon of 
my heart. 

They guided me all the day long to 
the mysteries of the country of pleasure 
and pain, and, at last, to what palace 
gate have they brought me in the 
evening at the end of my journey? 




Painted bij Abanindmnath Tufjore 

Ever in my life have I sought thee with my songs 



GITANJALI 93 



102 

I BOASTED among men that I had 
known you. They see your pictures in 
all works of mine. They come and ask 
me, "Who is he.^^'* I know not how 
to answer them. I say, "Indeed, I 
cannot tell." They blame me and they 
go away in scorn. And you sit there 
smiling. 

I put my tales of you into lasting 
songs. The secret gushes out from my 
heart. They come and ask me, "Tell 
me all your meanings." I know not 
how to answer them. I say, "Ah, who 
knows what they mean!" They smile 
and go away in utter scorn. And you 
sit there smiling. 



94 GITANJALI 



103 

In one salutation to thee, my God, let 
all my senses spread out and touch this 
world at thy feet. 

Like a rain-cloud of July hung low 
with its burden of unshed showers let 
all my mind bend down at thy door in 
one salutation to thee. 

Let all my songs gather together 
their diverse strains into a single cur- 
rent and flow to a sea of silence in one 
salutation to thee. 

Like a flock of homesick cranes flying 
night and day back to their mountain 
nests let all my life take its voyage to 
its eternal home in one salutation to 
thee. 



These translations are of poems con- 
tained in three books — Naivedya, 
KheyS., and Gitanjali — to be had at 
the Indian Publishing House, 22 
CornwalHs Street, Calcutta; and of 
a few poems which have appeared 
only in periodicals. 



95 



FRUIT-GATHERING 



Bid me and I shall gather my fruits to 
bring them in full baskets into your 
courtyard, though some are lost and 
some not ripe. 

For the season grows heavy with its 
fulness, and there is a plaintive shep- 
herd's pipe in the shade. 

Bid me and I shall set sail on the 
river. 

The March wind is fretful, fretting 
the languid waves into murmurs. 

The garden has yielded its all, and 
in the weary hour of evening the call 
comes from your house on the shore in 
the sunset. 



100 FEUIT-GATHERING 



n 



My life when young was like a flower — 
a flower that loosens a petal or two 
from her abundance and never feels 
the loss when the spring breeze comes 
to beg at her door. 

Now at the end of youth my life is 
like a fruit, having nothing to spare, 
and waiting to offer herself completely 
with her full burden of sweetness. 




Painted by Ahanindranath Tagore 

Is summer's festival only for fresh blossoms and not 
also for withered leaves and faded flowers ? 



FRUIT-GATHERING 101 



ni 

Is summer's festival only for fresh 
blossoms and not also for withered 
leaves and faded flowers? 

Is the song of the sea in tune only 
with the rising waves? 

Does it not also sing with the waves 
that fall? 

Jewels are woven into the carpet 
where stands my king, but there are 
patient clods waiting to be touched by 
his feet. 

Few are the wise and the great who 
sit by my Master, but he has taken the 
foolish in his arms and made me his 
servant for ever. 



102 FRUIT-GATHERING 



IV 



I WOKE and found his letter with the 
morning. 

I do not know what it says, for I 
cannot read. 

I shall leave the wise man alone with 
his books, I shall not trouble him, for 
who knows if he can read what the 
letter says. 

Let me hold it to my forehead and 
press it to my heart. 

When the night grows still and stars 
come out one by one I will spread it 
on my lap and stay silent. 

The rustling leaves will read it aloud 
to me, the rushing stream will chant it, 
and the seven wise stars will sing it to 
me from the sky. 



FRUIT-GATHERING 103 

I cannot find what I seek, I cannot 
understand what I would learn; but 
this unread letter has lightened my 
burdens and turned my thoughts into 
songs. 



104 FRUIT-GATHERING 



A HANDFUL of dust could hide your 
signal when I did not know its mean- 
ing. 

Now that I am wiser I read it in all 
that hid it before. 

It is painted in petals of flowers; 
waves flash it from their foam; hills 
hold it high on their summits. 

I had my face turned from you, 
therefore I read the letters awry and 
knew not their meaning. 



FRUIT-GATHERING 105 



VI 



Where roads are made I lose my 
way. 

In the wide water, in the blue sky 
there is no line of a track. 

The pathway is hidden by the birds' 
wings, by the star-fires, by the flowers 
of the wayfaring seasons. 

And I ask my heart if its blood 
carries the wisdom of the unseen way. 



106 FRUIT-GATHERING 



VII 

Alas, I cannot stay in the house, and 
home has become no home to me, for 
the eternal Stranger calls, he is going 
along the road. 

The sound of his footfall knocks at 
my breast; it pains me! 

The wind is up, the sea is moaning. 

I leave all my cares and doubts 
to follow the homeless tide, for the 
Stranger calls me, he is going along 
the road. 



FRUIT-GATHERING 107 



vni 

Be ready to launch forth, my heart! 
and let those linger who must. 

For your name has been called in the 
morning sky. 

Wait for none! 

The desire of the bud is for the night 
and dew, but the blown flower cries for 
the freedom of light. 

Burst your sheath, my heart, and 
come forth! 



108 FRUIT-GATHERING 



IX 



When I lingered among my hoarded 
treasure I felt like a worm that feeds 
in the dark upon the fruit where it 
was born. 

I leave this prison of decay. 

I care not to haunt the mouldy still- 
ness, for I go in search of everlasting 
youth; I throw away all that is not 
one with my life nor as light as my 
laughter. 

I run through time and, O my 
heart, in your chariot dances the poet 
who sings while he wanders. 



FRUIT-GATHEHING 109 



You took my hand and drew me to 
your side, made me sit on the high seat 
before all men, till I became timid, 
unable to stir and walk my own way; 
doubting and debating at every step 
lest I should tread upon any thorn of 
their disfavour. 

I am freed at last! 

The blow has come, the drum of 
insult sounded, my seat is laid low in 
the dust. 

My paths are open before me. 

My wings are full of the desire of 
the sky. 

I go to join the shooting stars of 
midnight, to plunge into the profound 
shadow. 



1 10 FRUIT-GATHERING 

I am like the storm-driven cloud of 
summer that, having cast off its crown 
of gold, hangs as a sword the thunder- 
bolt upon a chain of lightning. 

In desperate joy I run upon the 
dusty path of the despised; I draw 
near to your final welcome. 

The child finds its mother when it 
leaves her womb. 

When I am parted from you, thrown 
out from your household, I am free to 
see your face. 



FRUIT-GATHERING 1 1 1 



XI 



It decks me only to mock me, this 
jewelled chain of mine. 

It bruises me when on my neck, it 
strangles me when I struggle to tear 
it off. 

It grips my throat, it chokes my 
singing. 

Could I but offer it to your hand, 
my Lord, I would be saved. 

Take it from me, and in exchange 
bind me to you with a garland, for I 
am ashamed to stand before you with 
this jewelled chain on my neck. 



1 12 FRUIT-GATHEllING 



xn 

Far below flowed the Jumna, swift 
and clear, above frowned the jutting 
bank. 

Hills dark with the woods and 
scarred with the torrents were gathered 
around. 

Govinda, the great Sildi teacher, 
sat on the rock reading scriptures, 
when Raghunath, his disciple, proud 
of his wealth, came and bowed to him 
and said, "I have brought my poor 
present unworthy of your acceptance." 

Thus saying he displayed before the 
teacher a pair of gold bangles wrought 
with costly stones. 

The master took up one of them. 



FRUIT-GATHERING 113 

twirling it round his finger, and the 
diamonds darted shafts of light. 

Suddenly it slipped from his hand 
and rolled down the bank into the 
water. 

**Alas," screamed Raghunath, and 
jumped into the stream. 

The teacher set his eyes upon his 
book, and the water held and hid what 
it stole and went its way. 

The daylight faded when Raghunath 
came back to the teacher tired and 
dripping. 

He panted and said, "I can still get 
it back if you show me where it fell." 

The teacher took up the remaining 
bangle and throwing it into the water 
said, "It is there." 



114 FRUIT-GATHERING 



xin 

To move is to meet you every moment. 
Fellow-traveller ! 

It is to sing to the falling of your 
feet. 

He whom your breath touches does 
not glide by the shelter of the bank. 

He spreads a reckless sail to the 
wind and rides the turbulent water. 

He who throws his doors open and 
steps onward receives your greeting. 

He does not stay to count his gain 
or to mourn his loss; his heart beats 
the drum for his march, for that is 
to march with you every step. 

Fellow-traveller ! 



FRUIT-GATHERING 1 15 



XIV 

My portion of the best in this world 
will come from your hands: such was 
your promise. 

Therefore your light glistens in my 
tears. 

I fear to be led by others lest I miss 
you waiting in some road corner to 
be my guide. 

I walk my own wilful way till my 
very folly tempts you to my door. 

For I have your promise that my 
portion of the best in this world will 
come from your hands. 



116 FRUIT-GATHERING 



XV 

Your speech is simple, my Master 
but not theirs who talk of you. 

I understand the voice of your stars 
and the silence of your trees. 

I know that my heart would open 
like a flower; that my life has filled 
itself at a hidden fountain. 

Your songs, like birds from the 
lonely land of snow, are winging to 
build their nests in my heart against 
the warmth of its April, and I am 
content to wait for the merry season. 



FRUIT-GATHERING 1 1 7 



XVI 

They knew the way and went to seek 
you along the narrow lane, but I 
wandered abroad into the night for 1 
was ignorant. 

I was not schooled enough to be 
afraid of you in the dark, therefore 
I came upon your doorstep unaware. 

The wise rebuked me and bade me 
be gone, for I had not come by the 
lane. 

I turned away in doubt, but you 
held me fast, and their scolding be- 
came louder every day. 



1 18 FRUIT-GATHERING 



XVII 

I BROUGHT out my earthen lamp from 
my house and cried, "Come, children, 
I will light your path!" 

The night was still dark when I re- 
turned, leaving the road to its silence, 
crying, *' Light me, O Fire! for my 
earthen lamp Ues broken in the dust! *' 




Painted bij AbanindrdiKiH' Tui/nn' 
I brought out my eartlieu lamp 



FRUIT-GATIIEUING 1 19 



XVIII 

No: it is not yours to open buds into 
blossoms. 

Shake the bud, strike it; it is beyond 
your power to make it blossom. 

Your touch soils it, you tear its 
petals to pieces and strew them in the 
dust. 

But no colours appear, and no per- 
fume. 

Ah! it is not for you to open the 
bud into a blossom. 

He who can open the bud does it so 
simply. 

He gives it a glance, and the life-sap 
stirs through its veins. 

At his breath the flower spreads its 
wings and flutters in the wind. 



120 FRUIT-GATHERING 

Colours flush out like heart-longings, 
the perfume betrays a sweet secret. 

He who can open the bud does it so 
simply. 



FRUIT-GATHERING 121 



XIX 

SuDAS, the gardener, plucked from 
his tank the last lotus left by the ravage 
of winter and went to sell it to the king 
at the palace gate. 

There he met a traveller who said to 
him, "Ask your price for the last lotus, 
— I shall offer it to Lord Buddha." 

Sudas said, "If you pay one golden 
mdshd it will be yours." 

The traveller paid it. 

At that moment the king came out 
and he wished to buy the flower, for 
he was on his way to see Lord Buddha, 
and he thought, "It would be a fine 
thing to lay at his feet the lotus that 
bloomed in winter." 

When the gardener said he had been 



122 FRUIT-GATHERING 

offered a golden mdslid the king offered 
him ten, but the traveller doubled the 
price. 

The gardener, being greedy, imag- 
ined a greater gain from him for whose 
sake they were bidding. He bowed 
and said, *'I cannot sell this lotus." 

In the hushed shade of the mango 
grove beyond the city wall Sudas stood 
before Lord Buddha, on whose lips sat 
the silence of love and whose eyes 
beamed peace like the morning star 
of the dew-washed autumn. 

Sudas looked in his face and put the 
lotus at his feet and bowed his head to 
the dust. 

Buddha smiled and asked, "What is 
your wish, my son?'* 

Sudas cried, "The least touch of your 
feet." 




Painted by Nandahil Bose 

TNIake me thy poet, O Night, Veiled Night 



FRUIT-GATHEHING 123 



XX 

Make me thy poet, O Night, veiled 
Night! 

There are some who have sat speech- 
less for ages in thy shadow; let me 
utter their songs. 

Take me up on thy chariot without 
wheels, running noiselessly from world 
to world, thou queen in the palace of 
time, thou darkly beautiful! 

Many a questioning mind has 
stealthily entered thy courtyard and 
roamed through thy lampless house 
seeking for answers. 

From many a heart, pierced with 
the arrow of joy from the hands of the 
Unknown, have burst forth glad 



l>t FRUIT-GATHERING 

chants, slinking tlio darkness to its 
foundation. 

Those wakeful souls gaze in the 
starlight, in womler at the treasure they 
have suddenly found. 

IN lake nie their poet, O Night, the 
poet of thy fathomless silence. 



FllUIT-GATllEUING 1^25 



XXI 

I WILL meet one day the Life within 
nie, the joy that hides in my Hfe, though 
tlie days perplex my path with their 
idle dust. 

I have known it in glimpses, and its 
fitful breath has come upon me, making 
my thoughts fragrant for a while. 

I will meet one day the Joy without 
me that dwells behind the screen of 
light — and will stand in the overflow- 
ing solitude where all things are seen 
as by their creator. 



126 FRUIT-GATHERING 



XXII 

This autumn morning is tired with ex- 
cess of light, and if your songs grow 
fitful and languid give me your flute 
awhile. 

I shall but play with it as the whim 
takes me, — now take it on my lap, now 
touch it with my lips, now keep it by 
my side on the grass. 

But in the solemn evening stillness 
I shall gather flowers, to deck it with 
wreaths, I shall fill it with fragrance; I 
shall worship it with the lighted lamp. 

Then at night I shall come to you 
and give you back your flute. 

You will play on it the music of mid- 
night when the lonely crescent moon 
wanders among the stars. 




Painlcd by Alxinindrunulh Tagore 

This autumn morning is tired with excess of light 



FRUIT-GATHERING 127 



XXIII 

The poet's mind floats and dances on 
the waves of life amidst the voices of 
wind and water. 

Now when the sun has set and the 
darkened sky draws upon the sea 
like drooping lashes upon a weary eye 
it is time to take away his pen, and 
let his thoughts sink into the bottom 
of the deep amid the eternal secret of 
that silence. 



128 FRUIT-GATHERING 



XXIV 

The night is dark and your slumber 
is deep in the hush of my being. 

Wake, O Pain of Love, for I know 
not how to open the door, and I stand 
outside. 

The hours wait, the stars watch, the 
wind is still, the silence is heavy in my 
heart. 

Wake, Love, wake! brim my empty 
cup, and with a breath of song ruflOie the 
night. 




be 



=~1 rH 



s 2 

5 -^ 



»> o 
•2 ^ 



FRUIT-GATHERING 129 



XXV 

The bird of the morning sings. 

Whence has he word of the morning 
before the morning breaks, and when 
the dragon night still holds the sky in 
its cold black coils? 

Tell me, bird of the morning, how, 
through the twofold night of the sky 
and the leaves, he found his way into 
your dream, the messenger out of the 
east? 

The world did not believe you when 
you cried, "The sun is on his way, the 
night is no more." 

O sleeper, awake! 

Bare your forehead, waiting for the 
first blessing of light, and sing with the 
bird of the morning in glad faith. 



130 FRUIT-GATHERING 



XXVI 

The beggar in me lifted his lean hands 
to the starless sky and cried into night's 
ear with his hungry voice. 

His prayers were to the blind Dark- 
ness who lay like a fallen god in a 
desolate heaven of lost hopes. 

The cry of desire eddied round a 
chasm of despair, a wailing bird cir- 
cling its empty nest. 

But when morning dropped anchor 
at the rim of the East, the beggar in 
me leapt and cried: 

*' Blessed am I that the deaf night 
denied me — that its coffer was empty." 

He cried, "O Life, O Light, you are 
precious! and precious is the joy that 
at last has known you!" 



FRUIT-GATHERING 131 



XXVII 

Sanatan was telling his beads by the 
Ganges when a Brahmin in rags came 
to him and said, "Help me, I am 
poor!" 

"My alms-bowl is all that is my 
own," said Sanatan, "I have given 
away everything I had." 

"But my lord Shiva came to me in 
my dreams," said the Brahmin, "and 
counselled me to come to you." 

Sanatan suddenly remembered he 
had picked up a stone without price 
among the pebbles on the river-bank, 
and thinking that some one might need 
it hid it in the sands. 

He pointed out the spot to the 
Brahmin, who wondering dug up the 
stone. 



132 FRUIT-GATHERING 

The Brahmin sat on the earth and 
mused alone till the sun went down 
behind the trees, and cowherds went 
home with their cattle. 

Then he rose and came slowly to 
Sanatan and said, ** Master, give me 
the least fraction of the wealth that 
disdains all the wealth of the world." 

And he threw the precious stone 
into the water. 



FRUIT-GATHERING 133 



XXVIII 

Time after time I came to your gate 
with raised hands, asking for more and 
yet more. 

You gave and gave, now in slow 
measure, now in sudden excess. 

I took some, and some things I let 
drop; some lay heavy on my hands; 
some I made into playthings and broke 
them when tired; till the wrecks and 
the hoard of your gifts grew immense, 
hiding you, and the ceaseless expecta- 
tion wore my heart out. 

Take, oh take — has now become my 
cry. 

Shatter all from this beggar's bowl: 
put out this lamp of the importunate 
watcher: hold my hands, raise me from 
the still-gathering heap of your gifts 
into the bare infinity of your uncrowded 
presence. 



134 FRUIT-GATHERING 



XXIX 

You have set me among those who are 
defeated. 

I know it is not for me to win, nor 
to leave the game. 

I shall plunge into the pool although 
but to sink to the bottom. 

I shall play the game of my undoing. 

I shall stake all I have and when I 
lose my last penny I shall stake myself, 
and then I think I shall have won 
through my utter defeat. 




T ' 




^ -^^R.. 



Painted hy Nohcndranctth Tagore 

A smile of mirth spread over the sky 



FRUIT-GATHERING 135 



XXX 

A SMILE of mirth spread over the sky 
when you dressed my heart in rags and 
sent her forth into the road to beg. 

She went from door to door, and 
many a time when her bowl was nearly 
full she was robbed. 

At the end of the weary day she 
came to your palace gate holding up 
her pitiful bowl, and you came and 
took her hand and seated her beside 
you on your throne. 



136 FRUIT-GATHERING 



XXXI 

"Who among you will take up the 
duty of feeding the hungry?" Lord 
Buddha asked his followers when fam- 
ine raged at Shravasti. 

Ratnakar, the banker, hung his head 
and said, "Much more is needed than 
all my wealth to feed the hungry." 

Jaysen, the chief of the King's army, 
said, "I would gladly give my life's 
blood, but there is not enough food in 
my house." 

Dharmapal, who owned broad acres 
of land, said with a sigh, "The drought 
demon has sucked my fields dry. I 
know not how to pay King's dues." 

Then rose Supriya, the mendicant's 
daughter. 



FRUIT-GATHERING 137 

She bowed to all and meekly said, 
*'I will feed the hungry." 

"How!" they cried in surprise. 
"How can you hope to fulfil that 
vow.'' 

"I am the poorest of you all," said 
Supriya, "that is my strength. I have 
my coffer and my store at each of your 
houses." 



138 FRUIT-GATHERING 



XXXII 

My king was unknown to me, there- 
fore when he claimed his tribute I was 
bold to think I would hide myself 
leaving my debts unpaid. 

I fled and fled behind my day's work 
and my night's dreams. 

But his claims followed me at every 
breath I drew. 

Thus I came to know that I am 
known to him and no place left which 
is mine. 

Now I wish to lay my all before his 
feet, and gain the right to my place in 
his kingdom. 



FRUIT-GATHERING 139 



XXXIII 

When I thought I would mould you, 
an image from my life for men to wor- 
ship, I brought my dust and desires 
and all my coloured delusions and 
dreams. 

When I asked you to mould with my 
life an image from your heart for you 
to love, you brought your fire and 
force, and truth, loveliness and peace. 



140 FRUIT-GATHERING 



XXXIV 

"Sire," announced the servant to the 
King, "the saint Narottam has never 
deigned to enter your royal temple. 

"He is singing God's praise under the 
trees by the open road. The temple is 
empty of worshippers. 

"They flock round him like bees 
round the white lotus, leaving the 
golden jar of honey unheeded." 

The King, vexed at heart, went to the 
spot where Narottam sat on the grass. 

He asked him, "Father, why leave 
my temple of the golden dome and sit 
on the dust outside to preach God's 
love?" 

"Because God is not there in your 
temple," said Narottam. 



FRUIT-GATHERING 141 

The King frowned and said, **Do 
you know, twenty millions of gold 
went to the making of that marvel of 
art, and it was consecrated to God with 
costly rites?" 

**Yes, I know it," answered Narot- 
tam. *'It was in that year when 
thousands of your people whose houses 
had been burned stood vainly asking 
for help at your door. 

*'And God said, 'The poor creature 
who can give no shelter to his brothers 
would build my house!' 

"And he took his place with the 
shelterless under the trees by the road. 

**And that golden bubble is empty 
of all but hot vapour of pride." 

The King cried in anger, "Leave 
my land." 

Calmly said the saint, "Yes, banish 
me where you have banished my God." 



142 FRUIT-GATHERING 



XXXV 

The trumpet lies in the dust. 

The wind is weary, the light is dead. 

Ah, the evil day! 

Come, fighters, carrying your flags, 
and singers, with your war-songs! 

Come, pilgrims of the march, hurry- 
ing on your journey! 

The trumpet lies in the dust waiting 
for us. 

I was on my way to the temple with 
my evening offerings, seeking for a 
place of rest after the day's dusty toil: 
hoping my hurts would be healed and 
the stains in my garment washed 
white, when I found thy trumpet lying 
in the dust. 

Was it not the hour for me to light 
my evening lamp ? 



FRUIT-GATHERING 143 

Had not the night sung its lullaby 
to the stars? 

thou blood-red rose, my poppies 
of sleep have paled and faded ! 

1 was certain my wanderings were 
over and my debts all paid when sud- 
denly I came upon thy trumpet lying 
in the dust. 

Strike my drowsy heart with thy 
spell of youth! 

Let my joy in life blaze up in fire. 

Let the shafts of awakening fly 
through the heart of night, and a thrill 
of dread shake blindness and palsy. 

I have come to raise thy trumpet 
from the dust. 

Sleep is no more for me — my walk 
shall be through showers of arrows. 

Some shall run out of their houses 
and come to my side — some shall weep. 

Some in their beds shall toss and 
groan in dire dreams. 



144 FRUIT-GATHERING 

For to-night thy trumpet shall be 
sounded. 

From thee I have asked peace only 
to find shame. 

Now I stand before thee — help me 
to put on my armour! 

Let hard blows of trouble strike fire 
into my life. 

Let my heart beat in pain, the drum 
of thy victory. 

My hands shall be utterly emptied 
to take up thy trumpet. 





Sf^ 



I'aiiittd b// AlMnuiJraiuiih Tiujorc 

The trumpet lies in the dust 



FRUIT-GATHERING 145 



XXXVI 

When, mad in their mirth, they raised 
dust to soil thy robe, O Beautiful, it 
made my heart sick. 

I cried to thee and said, "Take thy 
rod of punishment and judge them.'* 

The morning light struck upon those 
eyes, red with the revel of night; the 
place of the white lily greeted their 
burning breath; the stars through the 
depth of the sacred dark stared at their 
carousing — at those that raised dust to 
soil thy robe, O Beautiful! 

Thy judgment seat was in the flower 
garden, in the birds' notes in spring- 
time: in the shady river-banks, where 
the trees muttered in answer to the 
muttering of the waves. 

O my Lover, they were pitiless in 
their passion. 



146 FRUIT-GATHERING 

They prowled in the dark to snatch 
thy ornaments to deck their own de- 
sires. 

When they had struck thee and 
thou wert pained, it pierced me to the 
quick, and I cried to thee and said, 
*'Take thy sword, O my Lover, and 
judge them!" 

Ah, but thy justice was vigilant. 

A mother's tears were shed on their 
insolence; the imperishable faith of a 
lover hid their spears of rebellion in its 
own wounds. 

Thy judgment was in the mute pain 
of sleepless love: in the blush of the 
chaste: in the tears of the night of the 
desolate: in the pale morning-light of 
forgiveness. 

O Terrible, they in their reckless 
greed climbed thy gate at night, break- 
ing into thy storehouse to rob thee. 

But the weight of their plunder grew 



FRUIT-GATHERING 147 

immense, too heavy to carry or to re- 
move. 

Thereupon I cried to thee and said. 
Forgive them, O Terrible! 

Thy forgiveness bm'st in storms, 
throwing them down, scattering their 
thefts in the dust. 

Thy forgiveness was in the thunder- 
stone; in the shower of blood; in the 
angry red of the sunset. 



148 FRUIT-GATHERING 



XXXVII 

Upagupta, the disciple of Buddha, 
lay asleep on the dust by the city wall 
of Mathura. 

Lamps were all out, doors were all 
shut, and stars were all hidden by the 
murky sky of August. 

Whose feet were those tinkling with 
anklets, touching his breast of a sudden? 

He woke up startled, and the light 
from a woman's lamp struck his for- 
giving eyes. 

It was the dancing girl, starred with 
jewels, clouded with a pale-blue mantle, 
drunk with the wine of her youth. 

She lowered her lamp and saw the 
young face, austerely beautiful. 

*' Forgive me, young ascetic," said 



FRUIT-GATHERING 149 

the woman; "graciously come to my 
house. The dusty earth is not a fit bed 
for you." 

The ascetic answered, "Woman, go 
on your way; when the time is ripe I 
will come to you." 

Suddenly the black night showed its 
teeth in a flash of lightning. 

The storm growled from the corner 
of the sky, and the woman trembled in 
fear. 



The branches of the wayside trees 
were aching with blossom. 

Gay notes of the flute came floating 
in the warm spring air from afar. 

The citizens had gone to the woods, 
to the festival of flowers. 

From the mid-sky gazed the full 
moon on the shadows of the silent 
town. 



150 FRUIT-GATHERING 

The young ascetic was walking in 
the lonely street, while overhead the 
lovesick Iwcls urged from the mango 
branches their sleepless plaint. 

Upagupta passed through the city 
gates, and stood at the base of the 
rampart. 

What woman lay in the shadow of 
the wall at his feet, struck with the 
black pestilence, her body spotted with 
sores, hurriedly driven away from the 
town? 

The ascetic sat by her side, taking 
her head on his knees, and moistened 
her lips with water and smeared her 
body with balm. 

"Who are you, merciful one?" asked 
the woman. 

"The time, at last, has come to visit 
you, and I am here," replied the young 
ascetic. 



FRUIT-GATHERING 151 



XXXVIII 

This is no mere dallying of love be- 
tween us, my lover. 

Again and again have swooped down 
upon me the screaming nights of storm, 
blowing out my lamp: dark doubts 
have gathered, blotting out all stars 
from my sky. 

Again and again the banks have 
burst, letting the flood sweep away my 
harvest, and wailing and despair have 
rent my sky from end to end. 

This have I learnt that there are 
blows of pain in your love, never the 
cold apathy of death. 



152 FRUIT-GATHERING 



XXXIX 

The wall breaks asunder, light, like 
divine laughter, bursts in. 
Victory, O Light! 

The heart of the night is pierced ! 

With your flashing sword cut in 
twain the tangle of doubt and feeble 
desires ! 

Victory ! 

Come, Implacable! 

Come, you who are terrible in your 
whiteness. 

O Light, your drum sounds in the 
march of fire, and the red torch is 
held on high; death dies in a burst of 
splendour! 




Painted hij Xnhindraiuitli Tagorc 

The wall breaks asunder, light, like divine laughter, 
bursts in 



FRUIT-GATHERING I5i 



XL 

O FraE, my brother, I sing victory to 
you. 

You are the bright red image of fear- 
ful freedom. 

You swing your arms in the sky, 
you sweep your impetuous fingers 
across the harp-string, your dance mu- 
sic is beautiful. 

TMien my days are ended and the 
gates are opened you will burn to ashes 
this cordage of hands and feet. 

My body will be one with you, my 
heart will be caught in the whirls of 
your frenzy, and the burning heat that 
was my life will flash up and mingle it- 
self in your flame. 



154 FRUIT-GATHERING 



XLI 

The Boatman is out crossing the wild 
sea at night. 

The mast is aching because of its full 
sails filled with the violent wind. 

Stung with the night's fang the sky- 
falls upon the sea, poisoned with black 
fear. 

The waves dash their heads against 
the dark unseen, and the Boatman is 
out crossing the wild sea. 

The Boatman is out, I know not for 
what tryst, startling the night with the 
sudden white of his sails. 

I know not at what shore, at last, he 
lands to reach the silent courtyard 
where the lamp is burning and to find 
her who sits in the dust and waits. 



FRUIT-GATHERING 155 

What is the quest that makes his 
boat care not for storm nor dark- 
ness? 

Is it heavy with gems and pearls? 

Ah, no, the Boatman brings with 
him no treasure, but only a white rose 
in his hand and a song on his lips. 

It is for her who watches alone at 
night with her lamp burning. 

She dwells in the wayside hut. 

Her loose hair flies in the wind and 
hides her eyes. 

The storm shrieks through her 
broken doors, the light flickers in her 
earthen lamp flinging shadows on the 
walls. 

Through the howl of the winds she 
hears him call her name, she whose 
name is unknown. 

It is long since the Boatman sailed. 

It will be long before the day breaks 
and he knocks at the door. 



156 FRUIT-GATHERING 

The drums will not be beaten and 
none will know. 

Only light shall fill the house, blessed 
shall be the dust, and the heart glad. 

All doubts shall vanish in silence 
when the Boatman comes to the shore. 




Painted by Nandalal Bosc 
I cling to this living raft, my body 



FRUIT-GATHERING 157 



XLII 

I CLING to this living raft, my body, in 
the narrow stream of my earthly years. 
I leave it when the crossing is over. 

And then.f^ 

I do not know if the light there and 
the darkness are the same. 

The Unknown is the perpetual free- 
dom: 

He is pitiless in his love. 

He crushes the shell for the pearl, 
dumb in the prison of the dark. 

You muse and weep for the days 
that are done, poor heart! 

Be glad that days are to come! 

The hour strikes, O pilgrim! 

It is time for you to take the parting 
of the ways ! 

His face will be unveiled once again 
and you shall meet. 



158 FRUIT-GATHERING 



XLIII 

Over the relic of Lord Buddha King 
Bimbisar built a shrine, a salutation 
in white marble. 

There in the evening would come 
all the brides and daughters of the 
King's house to offer flowers and light 
lamps. 

When the son became king in his 
time he washed his father's creed 
away with blood, and lit sacrificial 
fires with its sacred books. 

The autumn day was dying. 

The evening hour of worship was 
near. 

Shrimati, the queen's maid, devoted 
to Lord Buddha, having bathed in holy 
water, and decked the golden tray w ith 



FRUIT-GATHERING 159 

lamps and fresh white blossoms, si- 
lently raised her dark eyes to the 
queen's face. 

The queen shuddered in fear and 
said, "Do you not know, foolish girl, 
that death is the penalty for whoever 
brings worship to Buddha's shrine? 

"Such is the king's will." 

Shrimati bowed to the queen, and 
turning away from her door came and 
stood before Amita, the newly wed 
bride of the king's son. 

A mirror of burnished gold on her 
lap, the newly wed bride was braiding 
her dark long tresses and painting the 
red spot of good luck at the parting of 
her hair. 

Her hands trembled when she saw 
the young maid, and she cried, "What 
fearful peril would you bring me! 
Leave me this instant." 



160 FRUIT-GATHERING 

Princess Shukla sat at the window 
reading her book of romance by the 
light of the setting sun. 

She started when she saw at her door 
the maid with the sacred offerings. 

Her book fell down from her lap, 
and she whispered in Shrimati's ears, 
"Rush not to death, daring woman!" 

Shrimati walked from door to door. 

She raised her head and cried, *'0 
women of the king's house, hasten! 

*'The time for our Lord's worship 
is come!" 

Some shut their doors in her face 
and some reviled her. 

The last gleam of daylight faded 
from the bronze dome of the palace 
tower. 

Deep shadows settled in street cor- 
ners : the bustle of the city was hushed : 
the gong at the temple of Shiva an- 
nounced the time of the evening prayer. 



FRUIT-GATHERING 161 

In the dark of the autumn evening, 
deep as a limpid lake, stars throbbed 
with light, when the guards of the 
palace garden were startled to see 
through the trees a row of lamps burn- 
ing at the shrine of Buddha. 

They ran with their swords un- 
sheathed, crying, "Who are you, fool- 
ish one, reckless of death?" 

"I am Shrimati," replied a sweet 
voice, *'the servant of Lord Buddha." 

The next moment her heart's blood 
coloured the cold marble with its red. 

And in the still hour of stars died 
the light of the last lamp of worship at 
the foot of the shrine. 



162 FRUIT-GATHERING 



XLIV 

The day that stands between you and 
me makes her last bow of farewell. 

The night draws her veil over her 
face, and hides the one lamp burning in 
my chamber. 

Your dark servant comes noiselessly 
and spreads the bridal carpet for you 
to take your seat there alone with me 
in the wordless silence till night is 
done. 



FRUIT-GATHERING 163 



XLV 

My night has passed on the bed of 
sorrow, and my eyes are tired. My 
heavy heart is not yet ready to meet 
morning with its crowded joys. 

Draw a veil over this naked light, 
beckon aside from me this glaring flash 
and dance of life. 

Let the mantle of tender darkness 
cover me in its folds, and cover my 
pain awhile from the pressure of the 
world. 



164 FRUIT-GATHERING 



XLVI 

The time is past when I could repay 
her for all that I received. 

Her night has found its morning and 
thou hast taken her to thy arms: and 
to thee I bring my gratitude and my 
gifts that were for her. 

For all hurts and offences to her I 
come to thee for forgiveness. 

I offer to thy service those flowers 
of my love that remained in bud when 
she waited for them to open. 



FRUIT-GATHERING 165 



XLVII 

I FOUND a few old letters of mine 
carefully hidden in her box — a few 
small toys for her memory to play with. 
With a timorous heart she tried to 
steal these trifles from time's turbulent 
stream, and said, *' These are mine 
only!" 

Ah, there is no one now to claim 
them, who can pay their price with 
loving care, yet here they are still. 

Surely there is love in this world to 
save her from utter loss, even like this 
love of hers that saved these letters 
with such fond care. 



166 FRUIT-GATHERING 



XLVIII 

Bring beauty and order into my for- 
lorn life, woman, as you brought them 
into my house when you lived. 

Sweep away the dusty fragments of 
the hours, fill the empty jars, and mend 
all that has been neglected. 

Then open the inner door of the 
shrine, light the candle, and let us meet 
there in silence before our God. 




Painted by ^ibanindnuuith iagorc 

The pain was great when the strings were being 
tuned, my Master! 



FRUIT-GATHERING 167 



XLIX 

The pain was great when the strings 
were being tuned, my Master! 

Begin your music, and let me forget 
the pain; let me feel in beauty what 
you had in your mind through those 
pitiless days. 

The waning night lingers at my 
doors, let her take her leave in songs. 

Pour your heart into my life strings, 
my Master, in tunes that descend from 
your stars. 



168 FRUIT-GATHERING 



L 



In the lightning flash of a moment 
I have seen the immensity of your 
creation in my Kfe — creation through 
many a death from world to world. 

I weep at my unworthiness when I 
see my life in the hands of the unmean- 
ing hours, — but when I see it in your 
hands I know it is too precious to be 
squandered among shadows. 



FRUIT-GATHERING 169 



LI 



I KNOW that at the dim end of some 
day the sun will bid me its farewell. 

Shepherds will play their pipes be- 
neath the banyan trees, and cattle 
graze on the slope by the river, while 
my days will pass into the dark. 

This is my prayer, that I may know 
before I leave why the earth called me 
to her arms. 

Why her night's silence spoke to me 
of stars, and her daylight kissed my 
thoughts into flower. 

Before I go may I linger over my 
last refrain, completing its music, may 
the lamp be lit to see your face and the 
wreath woven to crown you. 



170 FRUIT-GATHERING 



LII 

What music is that in whose measure 
the world is rocked? 

We laugh when it beats upon the 
crest of life, we shrink in terror when 
it returns into the dark. 

But the play is the same that comes 
and goes with the rhythm of the end- 
less music. 

You hide your treasure in the palm 
of your hand, and we cry that we are 
robbed. 

But open and shut your palm as you 
will, the gain and the loss are the same. 

At the game you play with your 
own self you lose and win at once. 



FRUIT-GATHERING 171 



LIII 

I HAVE kissed this world with my eyes 
and my Hmbs; I have wrapt it within 
my heart in numberless folds; I have 
flooded its days and nights with 
thoughts till the world and my life 
have grown one, — and I love my life 
because I love the light of the sky so 
enwoven with me. 

If to leave this world be as real as 
to love it — then there must be a mean- 
ing in the meeting and the parting of 
life. 

If that love were deceived in death, 
then the canker of this deceit would 
eat into all things, and the stars would 
shrivel and grow black. 



172 FRUIT-GATHERING 



LIV 

The Cloud said to me, "I vanish"; 
the Night said, "I plunge into the 
fiery dawn." 

The Pain said, *'I remain in deep 
silence as his footprint." 

*'I die into the fulness," said my life 
to me. 

The Earth said, **My lights kiss your 
thoughts every moment." 

*'The days pass," Love said, "but I 
wait for you." 

Death said, "I ply the boat of your 
life across the sea," 



FRUIT-GATHERING 173 



LV 

TuLSiDAS, the poet, was wandering, 
deep in thought, by the Ganges, in that 
lonely spot where they burn their dead. 

He found a woman sitting at the 
feet of the corpse of her dead husband, 
gaily dressed as for a wedding. 

She rose as she saw him, bowed to 
him, and said, "Permit me. Master, 
with your blessing, to follow my hus- 
band to heaven." 

"Why such hurry, my daughter.'^" 
asked Tulsidas. "Is not this earth also 
His who made heaven.'^" 

"For heaven I do not long," said 
the woman. "I want my husband." 

Tulsidas smiled and said to her, "Go 
back to your home, my child. Before 
the month is over you will find your 
husband." 



174 rRUIT-Gx\THERING 

The woman went back with glad 
hope. Tulsidas came to her every day 
and gave her high thoughts to think, 
till her heart was filled to the brim 
with divine love. 

When the month was scarcely over, 
her neighbours came to her, asking, 
*' Woman, have you found your hus- 
band.?" 

The widow smiled and said, "I 
have." 

Eagerly they asked, "Where is he?'* 

"In my heart is my lord, one with 
me," said the woman. 



FRUIT-GATHERING 175 



LVI 

You came for a moment to my side 
and touched me with the great mys- 
tery of the woman that there is in the 
heart of creation. 

She who is ever returning to God 
his own outflowing of sweetness; she is 
the ever fresh beauty and youth in 
nature; she dances in the bubbhng 
streams and sings in the morning Hght; 
she with heaving waves suckles the 
thirsty earth; in her the Eternal One 
breaks in two in a joy that no longer 
may contain itself, and overflows in the 
pain of love. 



176 FRUIT-GATHERING 



LVII 

Who is she who dwells in my heart, 
the woman forlorn for ever? 

I wooed her and I failed to win her. 

I decked her with wreaths and sang 
in her praise. 

A smile shone in her face for a mo- 
ment, then it faded. 

**I have no joy in thee," she cried, 
the woman in sorrow. 

I bought her jewelled anklets and 
fanned her with a fan gem-studded; I 
made her a bed on a bedstead of gold. 

There flickered a gleam of gladness 
in her eyes, then it died. 

*'I have no joy in these," she cried, 
the woman in sorrow. 

I seated her upon a car of triumph 



FRUIT-GATHERING 177 

and drove her from end to end of the 
earth. 

Conquered hearts bowed down at 
her feet, and shouts of applause rang in 
the sky. 

Pride shone in her eyes for a mo- 
ment, then it was dimmed in tears. 

*'I have no joy in conquest," she 
cried, the woman in sorrow. 

I asked her, "Tell me whom do you 
seek.?" 

She only said, "I wait for him of the 
unknown name." 

Days pass by and she cries, "When 
will my beloved come whom I know 
not, and be known to me for ever? " 



178 FRUIT-GATHERING 



LVin 

Yours is the light that breaks forth 
from the dark, and the good that 
sprouts from the cleft heart of strife. 

Yours is the house that opens upon 
the world, and the love that calls to 
the battlefield. 

Yours is the gift that still is a gain 
when everything is a loss, and the life 
that flows through the caverns of 
death. 

Yours is the heaven that lies in the 
common dust, and you are there for 
me, you are there for all. 



FRUIT-GATHERING 179 



LIX 

When the weariness of the road is 
upon me, and the thirst of the sultry 
day; when the ghostly hours of the 
dusk throw their shadows across my 
life, then I cry not for your voice only, 
my friend, but for your touch. 

There is an anguish in my heart for 
the burden of its riches not given to 
you. 

Put out your hand through the 
night, let me hold it and fill it and keep 
it; let me feel its touch along the 
lengthening stretch of my loneliness. 



180 FRUIT-GATHERING 



LX 

The odour cries in the bud, "Ah me, 
the day departs, the happy day of 
spring, and I am a prisoner in petals!" 

Do not lose heart, timid thing! 

Your bonds will burst, the bud will 
open into flower, and when you die in 
the fulness of life, even then the spring 
will live on. 

The odour pants and flutters within 
the bud, crying, *' Ah me, the hours pass 
by, yet I do not know where I go, or 
what it is I seek!" 

Do not lose heart, timid thing! 

The spring breeze has overheard 
your desire, the day will not end before 
you have fulfilled your being. 

Dark is the future to her, and the 



FRUIT-GATHERING 181 

odour cries in despair, "Ah me, through 

whose fault is my Hfe so unmeaning? 
"Who can tell me, why I am at all? " 
Do not lose heart, timid thing! 
The perfect dawn is near when you 

will mingle your life with all life and 

know at last your purpose. 



182 FRUIT-GATHERING 



LXI 

She is still a child, my lord. 

She runs about your palace and 
plays, and tries to make of you a play- 
thing as well. 

She heeds not when her hair tumbles 
down and her careless garment drags in 
the dust. 

She falls asleep when you speak to 
her and answers not — and the flower 
you give her in the morning slips to the 
dust from her hands. 

When the storm bursts and darkness 
is over the sky she is sleepless; her 
dolls he scattered on the earth and she 
clings to you in terror. 

She is afraid that she may fail in 
service to you. 

But with a smile you watch her at 
her game. 




Painted by Nandalal Bose 
She is still a child 



FRUIT-GATHERING 183 

You know her. 

The child sitting in the dust is your 
destined bride; her play will be stilled 
and deepened into love. 



184 FRUIT-GATHERING 



LXII 

"What is there but the sky, O Sun, 
that can hold thine image?" 

"I dream of thee, but to serve thee 
I can never hope," the dewdrop wept 
and said, "I am too small to take thee 
unto me, great lord, and my life is all 
tears." 

"I illumine the limitless sky, yet I 
can yield myself up to a tiny drop of 
dew," thus the Sun said; "I shall be- 
come but a sparkle of light and fill you, 
and your little life will be a laughing 
orb." 



FRUIT-GATHERING 185 



LXIII 

Not for me is the love that knows no 
restraint, but like the foaming wine 
that having burst its vessel in a mo- 
ment would run to waste. 

Send me the love which is cool and 
pure like your rain that blesses the 
thirsty earth and fills the homely 
earthen jars. 

Send me the love that would soak 
down into the centre of being, and from 
there would spread like the unseen sap 
through the branching tree of life, giv- 
ing birth to fruits and flowers. 

Send me the love that keeps the 
heart still with the fulness of peace. 



186 FRUIT-GATHERING 



LXIV 

The sun had sot on the western mar- 
gin of the river among the tangle of 
the forest. 

The hermit boys had brought the 
cattle home, and sat round the fire to 
listen to the master, Guatama, when a 
strange boy came, and greeted him 
with fruits and flowers, and, bowing 
low at his feet, spoke in a bird-like 
voice — "Lord, I have come to thee to 
be taken into the path of the supreme 
Truth. 

"My name is Satyakama." 

"Blessings be on thy head,'* said tlie 
master. 

"Of what clan art thou, my child.'* 
It is only fitting for a Brahmin to 
aspire to tlie highest wisdom." 



FRUIT-GATHERING 187 

"Master," answered the boy, *'I 
know not of what clan I am. I shall 
go and ask my mother." 

Thus saying, Satyakama took leave, 
and wading across the shallow stream, 
came back to his mother's hut, which 
stood at the end of the sandy waste at 
the edge of the sleeping village. 

The lamp burnt dimly in the room, 
and the mother stood at the door in the 
dark waiting for her son's return. 

She clasped him to her bosom, kissed 
him on his hair, and asked him of his 
errand to the master. 

"What is the name of my father, 
dear mother.''" asked the boy. 

" It is only fitting for a Brahmin to 
aspire to the highest wisdom, said Lord 
Guatama to me." 

The woman lowered her eyes, and 
spoke in a whisper. 



1S8 FRUIT-GATHERING 

"In my youth I was poor and had 
many masters. Thou didst come to 
thy mother Jabala's arms, my darUng, 
who had no husband.'* 

The early rays of the sun ghstened 
on the tree-tops of the forest hermi- 
tage. 

The students, with their tangled 
hair still wet with their morning bath, 
sat under the ancient tree, before the 
master. 

There came Satyakama. 

He bowed low at the feet of the 
sage, and stood silent. 

"Tell me," the great teacher asked 
him, "of what clan art thou.'^" 

"My lord," he answered, "I know it 
not. My mother said when I asked 
her, 'I had served many masters in my 
youth, and thou hadst come to thy 
mother Jabala's arms, who had no 
husband. ' " 



FRUIT-GATHERING 189 

There rose a murmur like the angry 
hum of bees disturbed in their hive; 
and the students muttered at the 
shameless insolence of that outcast. 

Master Guatama rose from his seat, 
stretched out his arms, took the boy 
to his bosom, and said, "Best of all 
Brahmins art thou, my child. Thou 
hast the noblest heritage of truth." 



190 FRUIT-GATHERING 



LXV 

May be there is one house in this city 
where the gate opens for ever this 
morning at the touch of the sunrise, 
where the errand of the light is fulfilled. 
The flowers have opened in hedges 
and gardens, and may be there is one 
heart that has found in them this 
morning the gift that has been on its 
voyage from endless time. 




Painted bij Abaniiulrauatli Tagore 

Maybe there is one house in this city 



FRUIT-GATHERING 191 



LXVI 

Listen, my heart, in his flute is the 
music of the smell of wild flowers, of 
the glistening leaves and gleaming 
water, of shadows resonant with bees* 
wings. 

The flute steals his smile from my 
friend's lips and spreads it over my life. 



192 FRUIT-GATHERING 



LXVII 

You always stand alone beyond the 
stream of my songs. 

The waves of my tunes wash your 
feet but I know not how to reach them. 

This play of mine with you is a play 
from afar. 

It is the pain of separation that 
melts into melody through my flute. 

I wait for the time when your boat 
crosses over to my shore and you take 
my flute into your own hands. 



FRUIT-GATHERING 193 



LXVIII 

Suddenly the window of my heart 
flew open this morning, the window 
that looks out on your heart. 

I wondered to see that the name by 
which you know me is written in April 
leaves and flowers, and I sat silent. 

The curtain was blown away for a 
moment between my songs and yours. 

I found that your morning light was 
full of my own mute songs unsung; I 
thought that I would learn them at 
your feet — and I sat silent. 



194 FRUIT-GATHERING 



LXIX 

You were in the centre of my heart, 
therefore when my heart wandered she 
never found you; you hid yourself from 
my loves and hopes till the last, for you 
were always in them. 

You were the inmost joy in the play 
of my youth, and when I was too busy 
with the play the joy was passed by. 

You sang to me in the ecstasies of 
my life and I forgot to sing to you. 



FRUIT-GATHERING 195 



LXX 

When you hold your lamp in the sky 
it throws its light on my face and its 
shadow falls over you. 

When I hold the lamp of love in my 
heart its light falls on you and I am 
left standing behind in the shadow. 



196 FRUIT-GATHERING 



LXXI 

O THE waves, the sky-devouring waves, 
glistening with hght, dancing with life, 
the waves of eddying joy, rushing for 
ever. 

The stars rock upon them, thoughts 
of every tint are cast up out of the 
deep and scattered on the beach of life. 

Birth and death rise and fall with 
their rhythm, and the sea-gull of my 
heart spreads its wings crying in de- 
light. 




Painted by Nandalal Bosc 
O, the Waves, the Sky-devouring Waves! 



FRUIT-GATHERING 197 



LXXII 

The joy ran from all the world to build 
my body. 

The lights of the skies kissed and 
kissed her till she woke. 

Flowers of hurrying summers sighed 
in her breath and voices of winds and 
water sang in her movements. 

The passion of the tide of colours 
in clouds and in forests flowed into her 
life, and the music of all things caressed 
her limbs into shape. 

She is my bride, — she has lighted 
her lamp in my house. 



198 FRUIT-GATHERING 



LXXIII 

The spring with its leaves and flowers 
has come into my body. 

The bees hum there the morning 
long, and the winds idly play with the 
shadows. 

A sweet fountain springs up from 
the heart of my heart. 

My eyes are washed with delight 
like the dew-bathed morning, and life 
is quivering in all my limbs like the 
sounding strings of the lute. 

Are you wandering alone by the 
shore of my life, where the tide is in 
flood, O lover of my endless days? 

Are my dreams flitting round you 
like the moths with their many-col- 
oured wings? 



FRUIT-GATHERING 199 

And are those your songs that are 
echoing in the dark caves of my being? 

Who but you can hear the hum of 
the crowded hours that sounds in my 
veins to-day, the glad steps that dance 
in my breast, the clamour of the rest- 
less life beating its wings in my body? 



200 FRUIT-GATHERING 



LXXIV 

My bonds are cut, my debts are paid, 
my door has been opened, I go every- 
where. 

They crouch in their corner and 
weave their web of pale hours, they 
count their coins sitting in the dust 
and call me back. 

But my sword is forged, my armour 
is put on, my horse is eager to run. 
I shall win my kingdom. 




Painted hy Siirendranath Kar 

The spring with its leaves and flowers has come into 
my body 



FRUIT-GATHERING 201 



LXXV 

It was only the other day that I came 
to your earth, naked and nameless, 
with a wailing cry. 

To-day my voice is glad, while you, 
my lord, stand aside to make room 
that I may fill my life. 

Even when I bring you my songs 
for an offering I have the secret hope 
that men will come and love me for 
them. 

You love to discover that I love this 
world where you have brought me. 



202 FRUIT-GATHERING 



LXXVI 

Timidly I cowered in the shadow of 
safety, but now, when the surge of joy 
carries my heart upon its crest, my 
heart clings to the cruel rock of its 
trouble. 

I sat alone in a corner of my house 
thinking it too narrow for any guest, 
but now when its door is flung open by 
an unbidden joy I find there is room for 
thee and for all the world. 

I walked upon tiptoe, careful of my 
person, perfumed, and adorned — but 
now when a glad whirlwind has over- 
thrown me in the dust I laugh and roll 
on the earth at thy feet like a child. 



FRUIT-GATHERING 203 



LXXVII 

The world is yours at once and for 
ever. 

And because you have no want, my 
king, you have no pleasure in your 
wealth. 

It is as though it were naught. 

Therefore through slow time you 
give me what is yours, and ceaselessly 
win your kingdom in me. 

Day after day you buy your sunrise 
from my heart, and you find your love 
carven into the image of my life. 



204 FRUIT-GATHERING 

LXXVIII 

To the birds you gave songs, the birds 
gave you songs in return. 

You gave me only voice, yet asked 
for more, and I sing. 

You made your winds light and they 
are fleet in their service. You bur- 
dened my hands that I myself may 
lighten them, and at last, gain unbur- 
dened freedom for your service. 

You created your Earth filling its 
shadows with fragments of light. 

There you paused; you left me 
empty-handed in the dust to create 
your heaven. 

To all things else you give; from me 
you ask. 

The harvest of my life ripens in the 
sun and the shower till I reap more 
than you sowed, gladdening your heart, 
O Master of the golden granary. 



FRUIT-GATHERING 205 



LXXIX 

Let me not pray to be sheltered from 
dangers but to be fearless in facing 
them. 

Let me not beg for the stilling of 
my pain but for the heart to conquer it. 

Let me not look for allies in life's 
battlefield but to my own strength. 

Let me not crave in anxious fear to 
be saved but hope for the patience to 
win my freedom. 

Grant me that I may not be a cow- 
ard, feeling your mercy in my success 
alone; but let me find the grasp of 
your hand in my failure. 



206 FRUIT-GATHERING 



LXXX 

You did not know yourself when you 
dwelt alone, and there was no crying 
of an errand when the wind ran from 
the hither to the farther shore. 

I came and you woke, and the skies 
blossomed with lights. 

You made me open in many flowers; 
rocked me in the cradles of many forms; 
hid me in death and found me again in 
life. 

I came and your heart heaved; pain 
came to you and joy. 

You touched me and tingled into 
love. 

But in my eyes there is a film of 
shame and in my breast a flicker of 



FRUIT-GATHERING 207 

fear; my face is veiled and I weep when 
I cannot see you. 

Yet I know the endless thirst in 
your heart for sight of me, the thirst 
that cries at my door in the repeated 
knockings of sunrise. 



208 FRUIT-GATHERING 



LXXXI 

You, in your timeless watch, listen to 
my approaching steps while your glad- 
ness gathers in the morning twilight 
and breaks in the burst of light. 

The nearer I draw to you the deeper 
grows the fervour in the dance of the 
sea. 

Your world is a branching spray of 
light filling your hands, but your 
heaven is in my secret heart; it slowly 
opens its buds in shy love. 



FRUIT-GATHERING 209 



LXXXII 

I WILL utter your name, sitting alone 
among the shadows of my silent 

thoughts. 

>-. 

I will utter it without words, I will 
utter it without purpose. 

For I am like a child that calls its 
mother an hundred times, glad that it 
can say "Mother.'* 



210 FRUIT-GATHERING 



LXXXIII 



I FEEL that all the stars shine in me. 

The world breaks into my life like a 
flood. 

The flowers blossom in my body. 

All the youthfulness of land and 
water smokes like an incense in my 
heart; and the breath of all things plays 
on my thoughts as on a flute. 



n 



When the world sleeps I come to 
your door. 

The stars are silent, and I am afraid 
to sing. 

I wait and watch, till your shadow 



FRUIT-GATHERING 211 

passes by the balcony of night and I 
return with a full heart. 

Then in the morning I sing by the 
roadside; 

The flowers in the hedge give me 
answer and the morning air listens, 

The travellers suddenly stop and 
look in my face, thinking I have called 
them by their names. 



in 

Keep me at your door ever attend- 
ing to your wishes, and let me go 
about in your Kingdom accepting your 
call. 

Let me not sink and disappear in 
the depth of languor. 

Let not my life be worn out to 
tatters by penury of waste. 

Let not those doubts encompass me, 
— ^the dust of distractions. 



212 FRUIT-GATHERING 

Let me not pursue many paths to 
gather many things. 

Let me not bend my heart to the 
yoke of the many. 

Let me hold my head high in the 
courage and pride of being your ser- 
vant. 



FRUIT-GATHERING 213 



LXXXIV 

THE OARSMEN 

Do you hear the tumult of death afar. 
The call midst the fire-floods and 

poisonous clouds 
— ^The Captain's call to the steersman 

to turn the ship to an unnamed 

shore, 
For that time is over — the stagnant 

time in the port — 
Where the same old merchandise is 

bought and sold in an endless 

round. 
Where dead things drift in the ex- 
haustion and emptiness of truth. 

They wake up in sudden fear and ask, 
"Comrades, what hour has struck? 
When shall the dawn begin?" 



214 FRUIT-GATHERING 

The clouds have blotted away the 
stars — 

Who is there then can see the beckon- 
ing finger of the day? 

They run out with oars in hand, the 
beds are emptied, the mother 
prays, the wife watches by the 
door; 

There is a wail of parting that rises to 
the sky, 

And there is the Captain's voice in 
the dark: 

"Come, sailors, for the time in the 
harbour is over!" 

All the black evils in the world have 

overflowed their banks, 
Yet, oarsmen, take your places with 

the blessing of sorrow in your 

souls ! 
Whom do you blame, brothers? Bow 

your heads down! 
The sin has been yours and ours. 



FRUIT-GATHERING 215 

The heat growing in the heart of God 
for ages — 

The cowardice of the weak, the arro- 
gance of the strong, the greed of 
fat prosperity, the rancour of the 
wronged, pride of race, and insult 
to man — 

Has burst God's peace, raging in storm. 

Like a ripe pod, let the tempest break 
its heart into pieces, scattering 
thunders. 

Stop your bluster of dispraise and of 
self-praise, 

And with the calm of silent prayer on 
your foreheads sail to that un- 
named shore. 

We have known sins and evils every 
day and death we have known; 

They pass over our world like clouds 
mocking us with their transient 
lightning laughter. 



216 FRUIT-GATHERING 

Suddenly they have stopped, become a 
prodigy. 

And men must stand before them 
saying: 

"We do not fear you, O Monster! for 
we have Hved every day by con- 
quering you, 

"And we die with the faith that Peace 
is true, and Good is true, and true 
is the eternal One!" 

If the Deathless dwell not in the heart 

of death, 
If glad wisdom bloom not bursting the 

sheath of sorrow, 
If sin do not die of its own revealment. 
If pride break not under its load of 

decorations. 
Then whence comes the hope that 

drives these men from their homes 

like stars rushing to their death in 

the morning light? 
Shall the value of the martyrs' blood 



FRUIT-GATHERING 217 

and mothers' tears be utterly lost 
in the dust of the earth, not buying 
Heaven with their price? 
And when Man bursts his mortal 
bounds, is not the Boundless re- 
vealed that moment? 



218 FRUIT-GATHERING 



LXXXV 

THE SONG OF THE 
DEFEATED 

My Master has bid me while I stand at 
the roadside, to sing the song of Defeat, 
for that is the bride whom He woos in 
secret. 

She has put on the dark veil, hiding 
her face from the crowd, but the jewel 
glows on her breast in the dark. 

She is forsaken of the day, and God's 
night is waiting for her with its lamps 
lighted and flowers wet with dew. 

She is silent with her eyes down- 
cast; she has left her home behind her, 
from her home has come that wailing in 
the wind. 

But the stars are singing the love- 



FRUIT-GATHERING 219 

song of the eternal to a face sweet 
with shame and suffering. 

The door has been opened in the 
lonely chamber, the call has sounded, 
and the heart of the darkness throbs 
with awe because of the coming tryst. 



220 FRUIT-GATHERING 



LXXXVI 

THANKSGIVING 

Those who walk on the path of pride 
crushing the lowly life under their 
tread, covering the tender green of the 
earth with their footprints in blood; 

Let them rejoice, and thank thee. 
Lord, for the day is theirs. 

But I am thankful that my lot 
lies with the humble who suffer and 
bear the burden of power, and hide 
their faces and stifle their sobs in the 
dark. 

For every throb of their pain has 
pulsed in the secret depth of thy night, 
and every insult has been gathered into 
thy great silence. 



FRUIT-GATHERING 221 

And the morrow is theirs. 

O Sun, rise upon the bleeding hearts 
blossoming in flowers of the morning, 
and the torchlight revelry of pride 
shrunken to ashes. 



Printed in the United States of Amerioa 



SI 



Deacidified using the Bookkeeper process. 
Neutralizing agent: Magnesium Oxide 
Treatnnent Date: May 2006 

PreservationTechnologies 

A WORLD LEADER IN PAPER PRESERVATION 
1 1 1 Thomson Park Drive 
Cranberry Township. PA 16066 
(724)779-2111 



